


Sempiternal

by nikolayevich



Category: InuYasha - A Feudal Fairy Tale
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-13
Updated: 2021-02-24
Packaged: 2021-03-13 00:33:54
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 22,015
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29393439
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nikolayevich/pseuds/nikolayevich
Summary: A faceless demon with an appetite for livers leads Inuyasha to a dying woman who points him in the direction of his 'hidden desires'. Unfortunately, Inuyasha follows her instructions without thinking and finds himself thrust forward into a future where a smattering of years have passed for everyone else, but only a few hours have passed for Inuyasha. Inuyasha is helped by a Sesshomaru who seems to have added an additional emotion to his previously two-max emotional repertoire, feels responsible for Inuyasha's general well-being, and knows how to intimidate Inuyasha with just a look. Inuyasha almost misses the days when he sat around at the well waiting for Kagome. The Sesshomaru of those days used to just ignore his existence instead of constantly annoying him to 'behave' or whatever.
Relationships: InuYasha/Sesshoumaru (InuYasha)
Comments: 23
Kudos: 102





	1. Longing

**Author's Note:**

> Hi y'all! If you're from one of my works of original fiction, I'm sorry that I haven't uploaded in ages. I was in a serious car accident a while back where my limbs were all broken. I was immobilized for a long while. I'm getting closer to where I was before, but I'm still not 100%. I'm trying to get back in the swing of writing. This story has been plaguing my mind forever. I never ship incest. Like ever. Except for these two. I'm not sure why. (Don't psychoanalyze me with an answer. I'm good lmao.)
> 
> This is not set that far in the future. I have specifics, but it's like within 100 years or so. It starts like one year after Kagome has been gone and continues on from there. 
> 
> I already feel like this story is going to be LONG. I have already written Ch. 2 and it's at like 10,000 words. I'm trying to edit it now. I'll post next week. Tags will be added as I continue along. They should be kind of tameish. I'll give warnings if anything changes. I hope you like it. This fic has made me so happy. It's been a while since I've felt this way. 
> 
> Thanks for reading!!!!!

On a day that seemed like any other, Inuyasha awoke with the feeling that someone was gripping his neck. He pressed his own hands to his throat, trying to rub away the sensation from his skin. The panic of imminent suffocation faded after only a few minutes of wakefulness, but his heart continued to thud in his chest for quite some time. Despite Inuyasha’s best attempts, he couldn’t remember what he had been dreaming about. 

Inuyasha watched the sunrise from the Bone-Eaters’ Well. He had perched himself at the top of the well after being unable to return to sleep. He sat on the wooden opening of the well with one foot dangling into the darkness and his leg curled underneath him. He often sought out the solace of the well when his life became too overwhelming. He was comforted by the presence of it. Kagome’s return to her time had left an ache within his chest. 

How was she? He wondered, staring down into the endless darkness of the well. He lazily scratched a claw against a knot hole swirl in the aging wood. A sliver of wood splintered off and pushed into the soft skin under his nail. A hiss of air escaped his mouth. 

“Fucking shitty well,” he grimaced, pulling out the offending piece with his teeth. He spat it out into the grass. A drop of blood swelled from the wound. Inuyasha had a very sudden urge to stick the injured digit into his mouth, and to suck the blood and the sting from the cut. He resisted the urge, suddenly worried that some lingering curse had infiltrated the wood and was now swimming through his bloodstream. He furrowed his brows, and stared down at his finger. He waited for it to sprout a head or an eyeball. While no demonic face, limb, or other extremity appeared from the cut, the splinter had separated the sensitive skin that connected his claw to his finger. 

Blood welled again beneath his claw. He gave in to his instincts, and sucked the digit into his mouth. His tongue laved at the small wound. The sting disappeared. Idiot. He thought to himself. The sun was still making its slow crawl up the sky. He tilted his head, eyes closing from the new glare of the sun, and listened to the sound of the wind whispering through the trees. His ears twitched restlessly atop his head as he listened for an unknown enemy. His mouth was dry. A leftover panic from his nightmare was still lingering within him. 

He couldn’t spend much longer hiding from the others. There had been a point where he had spent days in constant vigil at the well. He had been so sure that Kagome would return at any moment. Some time had passed since those days. Inuyasha’s guard had lessened, and his time at the well was spent dozing instead of watching. As with most things in his life, staring into the well had grown boring. Sometimes there would be demons to kill, but most of his days were spent alone.

While he never tried to think of Kagome, he missed her. It wasn’t like he had spent the last year counting the days, or hours, or minutes, or sometimes seconds since he last saw her. He tried not to think of fevered moments whenever he thought he saw a glimpse of her black hair in the well. She never emerged from the depths. Would there be a day when he no longer remembered her scent or the sound of her laugh? 

The sun had risen high in the sky by the time Inuyasha finally abandoned his post. The summer heat made the days stretch long enough to be considered unbearable, but this day was particularly brutal. Inuyasha had no pressing matters to attend to in the village, but his feet took him towards it out of habit. He squinted up at the sky as he walked. It seemed that even the clouds had fled from the sun. There was a prickling beneath his skin that made the ache in his chest only that more pronounced. He wanted to rip up his skin and itch underneath it. 

“Are you spending time at the well again, young Inuyasha?” Kaede’s voice greeted him as he slunk back into the village. She hadn’t paused her task of pinning clean laundry to the line in order to look at him. Rin stood quietly at her side. Her eyes followed Inuyasha’s movements. 

“Why the fuck would I do that? She ain’t coming back,” Inuyasha scoffed in response. He pointedly ignored the searching look Kaede shot him over her shoulder. 

It wasn’t that Inuyasha had given up on waiting for Kagome. It was more that he had become so fucking tired of everyone constantly trying to get him away from it. He really couldn’t blame them. There had been a point where he was spending almost every waking hour at the well. Sango, Miroku, and Shippo tried almost everything to get him to abandon the well There had been a point, when it was especially bad, where even Sesshomaru would randomly appear in the distance to stare at him. It was his brother’s staring that finally pushed Inuyasha to abandon his obsessive watch of the well. Sesshomaru gaze clearly communicated his disgust. Plus, it was fucking annoying. It wasn’t like the fucker would say anything to him. He would just walk into the clearing, stare at him for three seconds, and then walk off. 

Inuyasha’s original plan for the day had involved relaxing beneath the cool shade of a tree, eating, and staring from a distance at Kin'u and Gyokuto. He spent more time than he’d like to admit in Sango and Miroku’s home watching the children from a safe distance across the room. He didn’t find them as annoying as he thought he would. He would often be overcome with a claustrophobic feeling back when they were first born. It took time for Inuyasha to realize that it was the way that Miroku and Sango doted on their children that made Inuyasha feel that way, not the children themselves. 

It wasn’t like he wasn’t interested in the babies. Inuyasha thought children smelled weird, but even he could admit that the girls were kind of cute. It took time, and a lot of coaxing from Sango and Miroku, but he finally managed to get close enough to them to fully appraise them. They were months old at that point. When he leaned forward to sniff at the one dressed in green, a piece of Inuyasha’s silver hair slid over his shoulder, and hung within grabbing distance of tiny hands. Chubby fingers grabbed at his hair and pulled. Both girls squealed with laughter as Inuyasha tried to save his hair from the closest baby’s grip without causing any damage with his claws. The problem was that the moment he saved one section of hair, the other baby would latch onto another piece. The babies had thought his muted cursing and wriggling had been hilarious. It wasn’t until Rin came to his aid that he was finally freed from their freakish baby strength. He was only sort of angry at Rin for her terribly muffled giggles. Inuyasha planned to stay out of reach until they were a little less fragile. 

Inuyasha didn’t know how to treat babies. It wasn’t like they could talk. He would not hold them despite Miroku and Sango’s encouragement. When the new parents held the girls, the looks they gave the babies made him uncomfortable. But it was the secretive looks the two shared after looking at the babies that made Inuyasha feel like he had been punched in the gut. He sometimes struggled to recognize his friends, even though they had barely changed. Although the two would never intentionally exclude him, he felt like he was constantly interrupting a joke that only the two of them understood. Miroku and Inuyasha still fought demons together, but Inuyasha could tell that their dynamic had changed. Miroku seemed to miss his family the moment he stepped out of the village. It kind of bummed Inuyasha out whenever Miroku got mopey and sappy over his family. 

Unfortunately for Inuyasha, his plan of resting was disrupted by his brother’s untimely arrival. It was Sesshomaru’s appearance that sent Inuyasha scurrying up into a tree like some bitch. Hiding up in the branches often benefited Inuyasha in more ways than one. He could avoid any direct interactions with his brother, while also being able to spy on Sesshomaru’s ‘kinder’ moments. Inuyasha reasoned that it was revenge for the times Sesshomaru had watched him at the well.

Inuyasha was almost mystified by Sesshomaru’s interactions with Rin. Inuyasha’s head would tilt to the side whenever Sesshomaru was around, as though it would improve his hearing, subtly trying to listen to whatever it was he said to Rin. He could hear them, of course, even without the tilt of his head. He never heard anything particularly interesting, but still he listened. The conversations were one-sided at best. Rin often chattered incessantly, telling Sesshomaru every detail of her very interesting life. Inuyasha rarely watched them outright. Watching Sesshomaru and Rin often left a bitterness in his mouth that he couldn’t define. Inuyasha had never been graced with Sesshomaru’s gentleness, but he had seen Rin experience it. Inuyasha’s stomach would flip whenever Sesshomaru would place a gentle hand onto to the top of Rin’s head. 

Inuyasha knew that his brother was made of flesh and bone just like he was. He knew that Sesshomaru had been a child at one point. Surely, he wasn’t more invincible than their father. Their father, whose grave had truly reminded Inuyasha of his own mediocrity, had lived longer than Inuyasha and Sesshomaru combined. Inuyasha’s feelings for his brother had lessened in intensity over time. He no longer resided as simply a devil in his head. He was, however, a mystery. Inuyasha knew very little about his brother’s life. Not that it really mattered. Sesshomaru probably just sat around with a stick up his ass anyways.

Sesshomaru rarely, if ever, acknowledged his existence. However, as if hearing Inuyasha’s thoughts, Sesshomaru paused at the base of the tree that Inuyasha was currently residing in. He tilted his head up, their eyes met briefly, but he did not speak to Inuyasha. His gaze seemed to convey a feeling of disapproval. Inuyasha recoiled and pressed himself back against the trunk of the tree, heart pounding like he had been caught doing something inappropriate. Inuyasha stayed in frozen in the branches until Sesshomaru moved on. The experience made him feel antsy and agitated. He felt like an idiot to hide like that, but he couldn’t attack Sesshomaru in the middle of the village. He had to do something or he was going to go insane. 

Inuyasha had fled the village before anyone could question him. While looking for a fight, Inuyasha had come across a lizard demon terrorizing two siblings. He killed it easily with a swipe of his claws. He then spent way longer than necessary listening to them beg him to kill another demon that lived up the mountain. They couldn’t give him any specifics about what it looked like, but they insisted that it was killing people in the middle of the day. The young woman of the pair was tearful during her explanation of their close encounter with the demon. The boy waved a small knife at Inuyasha while exclaiming that he could have easily killed the demon if his sister hadn’t made them sneak away. 

They were dirty, covered in scratches and cuts, but not permanently injured. Suspicion tinged Inuyasha’s thoughts. The insatiable itch beneath his skin had returned full force. He couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong about the encounter. Despite his recent killing of the lizard demon, Inuyasha still craved a challenge. The demon the two spoke of could prove to be the distraction he needed. Plus, he didn’t really want to return to the village after hiding from his brother like a little bitch. 

Inuyasha interrogated the boy and the girl about the demon. How had they gotten away? Why couldn’t they describe it? It was then that the tears started pouring from both of their eyes. Crying made Inuyasha extremely uncomfortable. He threatened to hit them, but the tears kept coming. Finally, he patted them both on the head like he had seen Sesshomaru do to Rin. He was only mildly surprised when they both stopped crying. It took time for the girl to calm down enough to tell him about how the two had crawled through the underbrush to avoid the demon. They could see its teeth as it disemboweled a man they had never seen before. The girl’s eyes were almost vacant as she spoke about pressing her hand against her brother’s mouth to keep him quiet. 

“It was like the man was alive while it was happening,” she whispered, and wrapped her arms around her body. “He turned his head to look at us while the demon was eating h-his stomach. He wasn’t even screaming. He was just smiling.” She shuddered. 

Inuyasha had to look away in feigned disinterest while she recounted her story. For some reason, it was hard for him to look at someone who had just witnessed a tortuous death for the first time. The boy didn’t seem like he had really comprehended what had happened to the man. He was bursting with bravado again. He brandished his knife again until his sister made him put it away. When Inuyasha finally agreed to kill the demon, they both thanked him for his help. Inuyasha sent them off in the direction of their village. 

Only a few moments had passed when Inuyasha heard the girl calling his name. He turned to see that she had paused on the path while her brother continued on. She rushed forward, insisting she had something important to say. She was rather pretty, even with her face being covered in patches of dirt. Inuyasha was glad that Miroku wasn’t there to perve on her. Though, his perving had slowed down considerably since his marriage. Her brown eyes were wide as she glanced around. Once she decided that no one was nearby, she spoke to him a low tone. “They say there’s a witch hiding up there. Father said that she was banished there years ago for practicing witchcraft.” 

“Feh,” He responded, crossing his arms over his chest. “Like a witch could do anything to me. Go home. And stop going to the mountain if you know it’s crawling with demons. Fucking idiots.” He grumbled the insult under his breath. 

She shrugged at him like there wasn’t much she could do about their treks to the mountain. She bowed to him in thanks. She turned and ran to catch up to her brother. Inuyasha watched as she slipped an arm around her brother’s shoulders. She squeezed him to her side. 

Inuyasha looked away. Again, he felt like he was intruding on something not meant for him. 

Inuyasha was able to follow the weakening smell of the siblings up the mountain. The scent of them had become stale in the wind. Inuyasha wasn’t able to lock onto the scent of the demon, but he could smell the blood. He followed the coppery scent towards the mangled body of a hunter. His stomach was ripped open. Intestines and other organs were hanging from the gaping hole in his skin.

Inuyasha swallowed down the bile that was threatening to escape. Although the area reeked of death and suffering, the man’s face was contorted into a smile that showed all of his teeth. His head was turned to the side. Brown eyes were staring, unseeing, at a section of thick foliage. Inuyasha went towards the bushes. His nose caught the faint scent of the siblings. He stared down into the bramble, and saw something move within. He reached deep into the branches. He hissed as his skin was scratched by small thorns. His fingers wrapped around a piece of fabric, and he yanked his hand free. He held a piece of a brown kosode that was a perfect match for the one the girl had been wearing. He rubbed it between his fingertips. He turned to look back at the man’s body. He tried not to think too much about that smile. 

He returned to stand by the body. The ground was sticky with blood. The area stunk of fear, but it was concentrated where the two had been hiding. The dead man had suffered, but he hadn’t been afraid. He had a long knife gripped in his left hand. There wasn’t any blood on the knife. The absence of it made Inuyasha’s heartbeat thump wildly in his chest. His ears twitched upon his head as he searched for any noises that were out of the ordinary. He listened for any movement. He stood still, but there was nothing there. He rubbed the back of his hand against his eyes. He was still gripping the piece of kimono. He shoved it into the sleeves of his suikan. 

A scream pierced the air. Inuyasha rushed towards the sound. He slid into a small open area with his sword drawn. The air was pungent with the scent of blood and fear. The trees had been cleared here. A leaning hut was to his left. A woman’s scream carried from the other side of the clearing. Inuyasha flinched. He could barely sense whatever it was that had the woman pinned. He saw it, but he almost wished he hadn’t. It was animal in nature. On all fours, it had the woman pinned beneath it. It was completely black. Inuyasha watched the muscles ripple underneath the skin. He had never seen anything like it. He stood with Tessaiga drawn for a breath. 

“Hey, fucker,” he called out at it. He grimaced at how weak his voice sounded. 

The demon pulled its teeth from the stomach of the woman. She groaned. The demon turned its large head to face Inuyasha. Inuyasha faltered, and stepped one foot backwards. It had no face. He could barely understand what he was seeing. There were no eyes. It had no facial features other than a massive maw that was hanging open. Blood dripped down teeth that seemed to be sharp as knives. Its tongue slid out to lick some of the blood from its teeth. It swallowed. 

It lunged at him, moving with feline grace. Inuyasha dodged, barely missing the terrible snap of those jaws. Inuyasha had to time the slashes of his sword, but he could barely make a scratch on it. He wanted to use Kaze no Kizu, but he worried about the woman that was very much alive on the ground. “Fuck, fuck,” he cursed as it appeared above him in the trees. He was able to dodge again. He cursed himself internally. He knew he was better than that. He had fought stronger demons, but the thing was unsettling. 

It barely made noise as it moved. It had no demonic presence. He wasn’t even sure if the thing breathed or not. In a moment of brash stupidity, Inuyasha jumped to the center of the clearing. He taunted the thing. “Come out, you no-faced fuck.” The adrenaline had returned the bravado to his voice. He was excited, suddenly, bouncing on his feet in preparation. 

His head turned at the creak of a branch, hair flying from the quick movement. He turned, raised his sword, and exclaimed, “Kaze no Kizu”. He slashed down. The attack hit the demon right as it came close. The demon flung backwards into the trunk of a tree. It landed with a thud on the ground. There was no accompanying crunch of bones that Inuyasha had grown used to hearing. He was breathing hard, and his shoulders twitched with every breath. His heart was flying in his chest. He stared at the body for what felt like an eternity, with his sword drawn, waiting for a twitch or a movement. It was definitely dead, or at least Inuyasha thought it was. He was almost entirely sure that the thing didn’t breathe. 

He crept close with a grip on his sword that turned his knuckles white. The thing lay on its side. There was a slice from the bottom of its jaw all the way to its back legs. A thick sludge of black blood was oozing from the wound. Inuyasha gagged. He released his double-handed grip on Tessaiga. It hung in one hand by his side. He brought his other arm up to his face, and pressed his nose against the sleeve of his suikan. He checked again to make sure it was really dead. First, he poked it with the tip of his sword. When that did nothing but bring out more black sludge, Inuyasha kicked it with his bare foot. His foot collided with the body. It was almost gelatinous in texture. It didn’t respond. He shuddered, and returned Tessaiga to its sheath. He rubbed his foot against the grass, trying to get the splatters of blood and slime off his skin. 

As if suddenly remembering her existence, Inuyasha rushed to the side of the woman the demon had been eating. He was embarrassed that he had gotten immersed in the battle and had completely ignored her. It wasn’t like he could have helped her while the thing was teeth deep in her gut. He knelt beside her. She had a thick gash on her stomach from the demon’s teeth. He wasn’t sure that there was anything he could do to help her. Inuyasha curled his arm around her shoulders, and gently lifted her to lean her against the trunk of the nearest tree. It had been mostly to move her out of the sticky pool of blood. Her hair was most likely white, but it was full of dirt and blood. Her skin was darkened and leathery from long hours in the sun. She was extremely old. She was mumbling to herself. She used a shaky hand to grip at the sleeve of her other arm. She yanked at it, and it ripped. Inuyasha was confused by her behavior until he realized what she wanted. Inuyasha was amazed that she had the strength to tear the fabric. 

Inuyasha took the sleeve from her shaky grip. She didn’t protest. Her breathing was labored. Her face contorted with pain with each breath. He pressed the sleeve against her stomach. She let out a wheeze of pain. His hand shook as blood soaked the sleeve. He used his other hand to grab one of hers. He replaced his palm with hers. He felt stupid having her hold her own wound, but he couldn’t leave his hand against the warm blood. He couldn’t keep feeling the way her stomach moved with each inhale and exhale. 

“Fuck was that thing?” He asked as he began to rub his blood covered hands onto his clothes. He would smell like blood, but at least it wouldn’t be sticky on his hands anymore. Inuyasha glanced at the demon crumpled not so far from them. His sword had damaged the ground as well as the demon. The ground was split down the clearing. It reached to a trampled garden next to that hut. There wasn’t much sun in that particular part of the mountain. It wasn’t the best place for growing, but he figured she did the best she could considering her circumstances. 

Looking at the body, he was reminded suddenly of the Noh Mask he had killed so long ago. The Noh Mask had desired a body, but the thing he had killed did have a body. He had fought Noh Mask with Kagome. Her image appeared in his mind. He shook his head to send it away. 

“Lookin’ for livers,” the woman finally spoke. Her eyes had slid closed. 

“Livers?” Inuyasha questioned. He was crouched at her side, but couldn’t bring himself to sit. 

“Only eats livers.” She responded simply. 

“What the fuck.”

She snorted in laughter. Her eyes opened. Inuyasha stared at them. They were almost milky and watery at the corners. Inuyasha wondered if she even could see. 

“I’m surprised you saved me,” she said, voice hitching with pain as she pushed herself into a more comfortable sitting position against the tree. 

Inuyasha snorted, “like I’d just leave some old crone to get chewed on.” He looked at the demon’s body once again. The air had filled with the rotting smell of decay. The woman smelled distinctly of unwashed flesh and blood. He had to breathe through his mouth for a moment to rid himself of the urge to gag. He guessed the liver thing made sense. He’d seen humans and demons alike eat the livers of animals. It didn’t explain the smiling or really anything other than what it was looking for. He wanted to ask her more questions about it, but couldn’t seem to figure out how to word them. 

Despite the egregious wound in her stomach, there was an almost pleased look in her eyes. She seemed to have given up on holding the wound with her hand. Her hand slid down to her lap. Inuyasha wanted grab her wrist and press her hand back to the wound. He couldn’t do it. The scent of blood was thick. He could hear her heartbeat slowing. 

“I’ll reward you,” she murmured. He looked at her in amazement. Normally, the reactions he received ranged from angry cursing about his half-demon status, to fear, to even indifference. People sometimes gave him things, but the average human did not. Though, he really was starting to think she couldn’t see that well. 

“Feh. Like I’d want anything you’ve got to give me.” He shoved his hands in the sleeves of his suikan. He could see her hut out of the corner of his eye. It was weatherworn. Inuyasha was sure that the walls did nothing to keep out the wind. She had a crazy look to her. The look of someone who had spent too much time on the outskirts of society. Inuyasha swallowed around a feeling that he couldn’t name that threatened to choke him. His eyes found the wound on her stomach again. The cloth had turned dark with her blood. He huffed, “stupid woman. You’re dying.” 

A thin finger, gnarled by time, pointed out towards the thick foliage. Her hand shook from the effort. “There,” she said, voice hushed, but with a trill of excitement as if sharing an important secret. Inuyasha’s ears twitched with excitement at the idea that he had uncovered something worthwhile. He did worry that he was about to listen to the insane ramblings of someone near death. He followed the direction of her finger as she continued speaking. “You’ll find what you’re looking for out there. Look into the water. See your true desires.” 

Inuyasha huffed, and looked back at her face. He searched it for deception. Finally, he said, “This better not be some witchy shit.” 

She showed him a smile that was gapped from missing teeth. The teeth she did have were yellowed and ground down from wear. Inuyasha’s nose scrunched at the smell of her breath. 

“Thank you for not letting me die alone,” she said with a smile that was more pained than joyous. 

“Yeah, whatever,” he responded, but his voice choked around the knot in his throat. He finally sank down from his crouched position like a puppet with his strings cut. He tried to act aloof. What was this feeling he had? He had no relationship to her, but his heart ached. He searched her face. Her eyes slid closed. 

“It’s a human desire to connect with one another,” she said, moments later, as if continuing an unfinished conversation. 

Inuyasha felt strange again, and reached out to hold her bloodied hand in his. He closed his own eyes, and listened as the thrum of her heartbeat slowed. How many deaths had he witnessed? He brushed the back of his free hand over his own eyes. His eyes were burned with fatigue. He was exhausted again by the weight of the death of a woman who hadn’t even given him her name. 

He buried her next to her home. It took hours to finish his task. He was alone again. He didn’t need to do it, but he wanted to. He felt strange leaving her body to decay alone instead of properly burying her. He didn’t go near the demon. He even avoided walking near the thing. He hoped he never had to see another one of those fucking things for the rest of his life. Besides, the demon’s body had begun to bloat. Inuyasha watched it as he finished putting the last bit of dirt on the woman’s grave. It would be horrific if the demon exploded and covered him in that black blood. 

It was a complete lack of forethought that caused Inuyasha to set sights in the direction the woman had pointed. He guessed he went on the journey out of respect for the woman. He wasn’t sure. He thought he would have been hungry at that point. He was wrong. The thought of eating had him gagging again. He didn’t want to explain what had happened to Sango or Miroku, so he set off on the path that lead deeper into the forest. He chose to follow it on the ground as opposed to bounding through the treetops. The beginnings of weariness settled in his bones. 

The woman must have used this path many times. The dirt was worn down as if followed repeatedly for years. He continued the path for so long that he had lost track of time. The sun couldn’t break through the thick canopy of trees above him. The trees themselves were extremely tall. They towered over him as if trying to reach up to touch the sun. Irritation began to erode at his flimsy attachment to that dead woman. 

He had kicked at a stone, cursing the woman, but immediately regretted it. It was his fault he had listened to a blind dying woman’s advice. He stared at where the stone had gone. He sucked in a breath at the sight of a patch of grass in a distance that had been folded in on itself. There was a smell on the air that urged him towards that patch of grass. The smell felt like a gentle hand on his back, coaxing him farther off the path until he was so far from it that he had no idea where he had come from. 

Inuyasha thought about turning back, but his body refused. His nose was filled with that sweet scent again. He followed the smell through a thickening of trees that were so close together that it seemed to create a barrier between him and whatever it was hiding. He could hear the trickling of water in the distance. His ears twitched in excitement at the sound, and he spared no time maneuvering between the trees. He could barely remember why he had come out there, but he knew he needed to get to the water. He stepped out into a meadow. The sun was in full brightness there. The sudden light almost blinded him. The grass was soft beneath his feat. His clawed toes flexed against it.

That sweet scent had turned pungent. His head felt fuzzy. There was a warmth blossoming in his stomach that felt extremely pleasant. His cheeks were flushed with excitement by the time he had found the source of the smell. A wall of flowers like nothing Inuyasha had ever seen before stood before him. Their height almost matched his own. He stared openly at them. They looked perfect. They smelled so good. He was overcome with the urge to touch them. He wanted to bury his face in the white petals. 

He leaned forward and rubbed his cheek against one of the large white petals. It was soft. He inhaled, trying to get as much of the scent into his nose as possible, and promptly sneezed. The pollen had gone up his nostrils. It burned. Feeling stupid, he swiped at the offending flower with his claws like a disgruntled cat. The plant was knocked out of the way for only a moment before it reared forward and smacked him in the head. He gripped the stupid thing by the stalk, and tried to yank it out of the ground. The stalk was thick and green with little tendrils that seemed to be grabbing at him as much as he was trying to grab at them. The other flowers danced in the wind as if they were taunting him. He could cut the fuckers up with his sword if he really wanted. He glared at them, but it was half-hearted. He felt almost dopey. 

The urge to destroy the flowers fled as quickly as it had come. The hair on the back of his neck stood. It was as if his senses flipped on all at once. Someone was watching him. Twitching, he reached for the sword at his hip. He was afraid for a moment before a pleasant delirium filled his head. He knew he should be concerned, but it was like he was drugged. He had been staring at the plants for too long. He couldn’t even remember why he was there.

There was a thought lodged in the back of his head. It irritated him, but he couldn’t really grasp at it. He knew something was wrong, but he didn’t want to believe it. In a moment of clarity, Inuyasha thought that maybe someone had been watching him since he found that hunter. The crack of a stick had him spinning around, sword drawn, to face his supposed assailant. 

But there was no one there. 

He glanced around. Grass danced in the wind. The flowers swayed. The wind blew pollen off of them in yellow puffs. He could hear a small rodent skittering up a tree. Two birds sang to each other in long whistles. He sniffed at the air, but came up with nothing. He could barely smell anything other than the flowers. 

He listened hard, trying to rely on his other senses. The sound of water roared in his ears. He found his mouth suddenly dry. Had he been looking for water? He stumbled through the wall of flowers. He became drenched in the smell as he maneuvered through the thick stems. The flowers seemed to be reaching out to grab him. He had to smack a few out of the way. 

Finally, he emerged from the forest of flowers. He was faced with a wall of rock. A waterfall roared in front of him. He couldn’t see where it started, but he saw where it ended. There was a large body of water before him. It looked completely clear. He could see small fish darting around in what Inuyasha assumed was the deepest portion of the lake. His throat contracted again. He was thirsty. His skin was too hot from the sun. It itched. 

To his eyes, the water seemed unassuming as he came upon it. There was a dull ache in his chest that had welled so deeply within him that he audibly choked. He was moved as if by an outside force. He fell to his knees at shore of the water. He ignored the flare of pain in his knees as he landed on the rocks. He pressed his hands against the sharp rocks with the same amount of force. He crawled forward on his hands and knees until he was submerged up to his wrists in the clear water. It was cold. He shuddered at the palpable difference between the heat in the air and the cold water. His movement had disturbed the sediment in the water, creating a sandy swirl that distorted his view of the lakebed. He cupped his hands in the water, leaned back until he was sitting on his feet, and sucked down the water and the dirt within it. 

Despite the gritty texture, the water was satisfying. It quenched his thirst. His breath gasped out of him like he had been drinking for a long time without taking a breath. Something was definitely wrong. Inuyasha knew that without a doubt, but he couldn’t control his actions. He leaned forward once more. He did not grasp at the water as he had before. Instead, he stared, wide-eyed, at his own reflection. Confusion churned through the fog in his brain. He brought a hand to his cheek. He brushed at it with damp fingertips. As he had thought, there was a crust of blood on his face. He pulled back his hand to look at it. The dull ache in his chest became unbearable. The water from his fingers had rewet the blood. It had tinged his fingers pink. 

He stared back down at the water in horror. He really hadn’t imagined it. The Inuyasha in the water looked perfectly clean. Water Inuyasha was not a direct reflection of himself. The reflection danced as ripples from Inuyasha’s movements disrupted the water. He couldn’t drag his eyes away from his own image. His reflection didn’t share his sentiments because he wasn’t looking back at him. His eyes were trained on something that the real Inuyasha couldn’t see. Whatever it was, it made the Inuyasha in the water seem excited. The tops of his cheeks were tinged red. 

A hand entered the frame. Inuyasha watched with suddenly clear focus as the hand cupped his reflection’s cheek. The other Inuyasha leaned into the palm of the offered hand. He sagged against it, eyes sliding closed in contentment. The wrist that was attached to the hand came into view. Inuyasha dragged his eyes off of his own face, and focused instead on the maroon markings on the wrist. 

As if pulled from a trance, Inuyasha jerked backwards. “Fuck,” he hissed. “What the fuck?” He knew that hand. His stomach clenched at the memory of that hand embedded in his stomach. Despite his better judgment, he chose to lean forward again. The Inuyasha in the water seemed to be enjoying the attention. The hand on his face was gentle. Sesshomaru’s other hand entered his view, and slid to rest between Inuyasha’s ears. It patted the hair there. Once. Twice. Three times. Then it began to stoke his hair.

Inuyasha’s head began to throb. The skin on his head tingled like he was actually anticipating a touch. He squeezed his eyes shut. He couldn’t escape the reflection. The image was there to greet him behind his eyelids. The flush of his own cheeks created a fluttering in his stomach. It was fake. It was a trick. When he finally felt like he could stomach it, he opened his eyes again. The other Inuyasha was gone. Sesshomaru’s hands were gone. He let out a shaky breath of relief. He sucked in another breath in shock immediately after. 

The water was gone. It no longer soaked through his clothes and chilled his skin. The sun was gone. He could no longer feel it on his back. It was dark. He squinted at the space between his hands. 

He was no longer staring down into clear waters. There was only soft dirt beneath his hands. The sweet scent was gone. All that was left was the smell of damp earth and bones. He reared backwards onto his knees. He was in the Bone-Eaters’ Well. He stood, horrified. Had he been dreaming? Was he in Kagome’s time? He looked up. He could see the sky. How had he ended up in the well? Why was he so exhausted? 

As if he didn’t have enough problems, he felt Sesshomaru’s presence. He was close. Inuyasha wondered if he was waiting right outside of the well. 

Inuyasha was reminded again of how tired he was. He was also ravenously hungry. His muscles protested his jump to the top of the well. His vision was swimming. Instead of landing safely outside of the well, his body thumped against the side of it. He was hanging by his hands. They gripped the lid of the well, but trembled from the weight of his body. His face was pressed against the wood. He hadn’t made it out of the well. He hung there for a few moments in a stupor. His toes dug against the slimy rocks for some sort of leverage. The feeling brought back the memory of kicking that demon. 

Inuyasha couldn’t believe he hadn’t cleared the top of the well. The strain in his arms was getting worse. Before he could pull himself out by his arms, a hand gripped him by the neck of his suikan. He felt oddly chastised being grabbed in this manner. As exhausted as he was, he went limp and allowed himself to be removed from the depths of the well. He was deposited onto the ground outside of it. Inuyasha slumped against the outside of the well. 

Although exhausted, his teeth were on edge to see the booted feet of his brother a few inches from his own bare feet. Inuyasha wished he could laugh at the idea that his brother had willingly sullied his own hand by yanking him from the well. Instead, his face burned to know that Sesshomaru was seeing him this way. The air outside was cold, but it did nothing for his flushed face. 

Their relationship had not evolved to anything close to friendship. If anything, Inuyasha would say it was more similar to a ceasefire. The mere sight of his brother no longer sent Inuyasha into a blind rage. Inuyasha couldn’t say he was delighted by his presence either. He was especially not delighted by Sesshomaru’s current appearance in front of him. Out of everyone to see him in a moment of weakness, why did it have to be him? Inuyasha’s eyes traveled up the length of Sesshomaru’s body. His intention had been to merely slow the meeting of their eyes, but Inuyasha found his stomach fluttering from the action. His skin itched when their eyes met. The reflected image from earlier roared like an alarm in his head. 

Sesshomaru seemed to be searching for something on Inuyasha’s face. His eyebrows titled slightly in what appeared to be a mockery of concern. Inuyasha was frustrated by the look. 

“What the fuck are you looking at, Sesshomaru?” He asked. His tone did not carry its normal spite. The events of the day had drained most of the fight from him. Inuyasha had never experienced exhaustion to this extent. He was cranky, but it had more to do with the fact that his eyes kept trying to slide closed rather than Sesshomaru’s existence. Though, his existence irritated him too. 

Sesshomaru’s eyebrows raised in question. It was his turn to look up and down Inuyasha’s body. Inuyasha shuddered as if Sesshomaru had actually touched him. 

“Not going to answer me, fuckwad?” He hissed. “But you’ll fucking molest me with your eyes.” Inuyasha felt like he was slipping and sliding trying to get a rise out of Sesshomaru. At least if Sesshomaru knocked him out in retaliation, Inuyasha could go to sleep. He wanted to escape the way Sesshomaru’s gaze suddenly made him feel exposed. 

Sesshomaru’s eyes snapped back to Inuyasha’s face from where they had been lingering on the beads at his neck. 

“As if I would lower myself to look at you in such a manner.” While Sesshomaru’s voice was haughty, it was void of his normal malice. They no longer fought physically, but their verbal sparring was often as vicious as their physical blows. 

Inuyasha’s brain pushed beyond the tired buffering it had been coasting along. He began to take in the strangeness of the current scenery. A shiver went through his body. His hands, which had previously been cradled on his lap, slid to his sides to rest against the ground. As soon as they touched the ground, he yanked them back onto his lap. He looked away from Sesshomaru to stare in horror at the ground. 

“What the fuck?” He whispered, staring down to look at the sea of white around him. He cupped his hand and dug out a cold handful of snow. He rubbed it between his fingers. He halfway expected it to disappear immediately. The snow between his fingers melted, but it made his fingers ache from the cold. He dug out another handful of snow. He hadn’t imagined it. It really was snow. He let go of it, watched it fall between his fingers, and then rubbed his hand against the thigh of his hakama to take away the chill. He looked back up at Sesshomaru in horror. It had been early summer when Inuyasha had saved that woman. How did he articulate that to Sesshomaru? Why should he even say anything? He didn’t want Sesshomaru to know anything about him.

“What the fuck?” He repeated. His tone was getting dangerously close to a whine. His self-esteem could not take the blow of whining in front of Sesshomaru. 

If Sesshomaru noticed, he said nothing about it. He was staring off into the distance. Inuyasha did not care enough to follow his gaze. When Sesshomaru finally spoke, his voice was deep and steady. “I believed it to be a mistake when I felt the call of your youkai. I had admonished myself for returning here.” He turned to look back at Inuyasha. “You look exactly as you did on that day.” 

Inuyasha’s head hit against the lid of the well with a loud thump. He could see his own puffing breaths. He stared at the sky above Sesshomaru’s head. Even without the layer of snow, he would have known it was a different season. The winter sky differed from the skies of other seasons. The sun was often dulled as if tired from its long trips during the winter. Inuyasha’s legs were chilled. He wiggled his toes. How had he not noticed the snow before? He had looked at both his own feet and Sesshomaru’s when he came out of the well, but hadn’t seen the snow. He tilted his head back to look back at his feet to verify that he wasn’t hallucinating. He could see the layer of snow beneath his legs and beneath Sesshomaru’s feet. The cold was radiating through his heels. The legs of his hakama were both wet from the knee down. They were muddy from dirt. Inuyasha furrowed his brows. There hadn’t been any water at the bottom of the well. It meant that strange experience hadn’t been a dream. He had been to that meadow with those flowers. He rubbed the palms of his hands against his eyes until he could see stars. 

The Sesshomaru in front of him seemed to be the exactly the same on first look, but Inuyasha couldn’t shake off the daunting feeling that this Sesshomaru was older. Physically, Sesshomaru looked exactly the same as when Inuyasha had seen him that very morning. He acted similar, but something was very different about him. Inuyasha could feel it. Sesshomaru seemed even more confident than before. Inuyasha could even feel that Sesshomaru’s strength had grown by a large margin. 

In a way that Inuyasha decided was very much un-Sesshomaru, Sesshomaru moved to a crouch next to Inuyasha’s right leg. Inuyasha, disoriented and exhausted, merely let out a noise of confusion. Sesshomaru reached forward with a clawed hand and firmly gripped Inuyasha’s chin between his thumb and forefinger. Inuyasha did not have the strength to resist, and allowed his head to be tipped upwards. Inuyasha’s heartbeat began to flutter wildly in his chest as their eyes met for a moment. The flutter of his heart crawled up his neck to pound in his head. 

Sesshomaru’s eyes trailed over every inch of Inuyasha’s face as though committing each inch of skin to memory. Inuyasha was in a stupor as he allowed Sesshomaru to tilt his head in whatever direction he deemed appropriate. After he thoroughly inspected Inuyasha’s face, neck, and even the top of his head, he let go of Inuyasha’s chin with a sound that was suspiciously close to a sigh. 

“You’re just a baby,” he said, finally, after what felt like a million years of awkward staring. There was a barely noticeable lilt in his voice that Inuyasha could not understand. Sesshomaru’s impassive gaze returned soon after. 

“And you’re just an asshole,” Inuyasha exclaimed, not really understanding what Sesshomaru meant, but he figured it was an insult. His face flushed with anger, and he grumbled under his breath about not being a baby. He used some of his waning strength to swipe at the other with his claws. Sesshomaru dodged effortlessly, and was standing at Inuyasha’s feet in the blink of an eye. He looked at Inuyasha almost expectantly. He seemed to be waiting for Inuyasha to say more. 

“Fuck off,” Inuyasha growled. His heart was beating wildly in his chest. His body was screaming at him to get up and fight Sesshomaru or to run far away. That wild swipe at Sesshomaru’s form had been the extent of Inuyasha’s current fighting ability. He knew he was in no shape to fight despite his lack of physical injuries. He was too tired to try to run and evade Sesshomaru anyways. He hoped Sesshomaru would become bored with his apparent inspection of Inuyasha, and leave him the fuck alone. He hated the way he stared down at him. Inuyasha needed time to sort through exactly what was going on. The itch in his skin began to get worse. 

“Can you stand?” Sesshomaru asked, ignoring Inuyasha’s comments. He did not even appear affronted by the attempted assault or by Inuyasha’s taunts. 

Inuyasha figured he had heard his brother say more to him in the last few minutes than he had in months. Inuyasha pushed himself to stand. His limbs were stiff and their movements awkward, but Inuyasha stood. Sesshomaru made no comment about Inuyasha’s lack of finesse. He did, however, give Inuyasha a sharp look when Inuyasha’s hand slid down to grab onto Tessaiga’s hilt. 

“You have no need to draw your blade,” Sesshomaru stated.

“I don’t know what the fuck is going on here, but you can go fuck yourself until you cry for all I care.” Inuyasha hissed, frustrated, but did not draw his sword. He tried to ignore the tingling in the soles of his feet. He kept his hand on Tessaiga’s hilt. He hoped it would ground him. There was a throbbing in his head that he felt in his teeth. 

“Your attitude has not bettered over the years, brother.” 

Inuyasha’s exhausted mind tried to process Sesshomaru’s words. “Years?” He croaked in response. It was hard to think around the pain in his head. He raised his hand and pressed it against his temple. It did nothing to ease the throbbing. Inuyasha fixed his gaze on Sesshomaru in an attempt to bring some logic into whatever was going on. 

Except he wasn’t sure that the person in front of him was Sesshomaru at all. The clothes were the same. His scent was the same. There was an emotion hiding deep within Sesshomaru’s eyes that Inuyasha had never seen before. Inuyasha chewed on his lip. Sesshomaru’s hateful gaze had definitely softened to indifference over time, but the look that this demon was giving him was extremely foreign. He seemed almost concerned. If Inuyasha hadn’t been well-versed in Sesshomaru’s complete lack of emotional range, he probably wouldn’t have noticed the way his brows barely tilted together. He had seen it moments before, but to see it again completely baffled Inuyasha. 

Sesshomaru seemed to be scenting the air. Inuyasha sniffed as well, but came up with nothing. He couldn’t even smell Sesshomaru. Inuyasha’s mouth moved on its own. He heard his voice slur around the words, “something is wrong.” 

The throbbing in his head was louder than before. It was a steady drumbeat of pain. Inuyasha’s head went forward limply. His chin rested against his chest. He stared down at the snow at his feet. Inuyasha’s eyesight had turned fuzzy, but he could make out round droplets of red marring the sea of white. Inuyasha watched as another drop landed between the others. His mind was protesting. A word now accompanied the pounding in his head. Blood, it said. Blood. Blood. Blood. 

“Inuyasha.” It was his name, but he couldn’t look up to find the speaker. 

“Inuyasha,” the voice said again. “Your injury… Where is it?” 

“Injury?” Inuyasha responded with a mouth that felt like it was stuffed full of cotton. His own voice sounded far away. He was so tired. He was mesmerized by the way the red in the snow continued to grow. It was pretty. He could even see thick rivers of it sliding down his feet. It was warm. 

Blood.

“…Bleeding… Let me…” The sound of the other voice was fading in and out. Inuyasha’s ears twitched, trying to pay attention. He could see a hand. It came towards his stomach. Multiple droplets of red landed on back of that hand. For some reason, it was hilarious to Inuyasha. Giggles built up in his stomach as the hand froze. The laughs escaped Inuyasha’s mouth. He could hear himself laughing, but it sounded like he was under water. 

He was so tired. His eyes slid closed. 

His knees buckled. 

Hands gripped his arms. 

Inuyasha lost consciousness.


	2. Lopsided

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you soooooo much for all the wonderful reviews! Truly, they have made me so overjoyed. I hope to respond to them soon! Sorry for taking over a week to write this. I really agonized over it for whatever reason. There's a lot of plot to this story, so I've been trying to keep it on the right track.
> 
> I hope you enjoy this chapter!

Inuyasha was burning from the inside. The blistering heat touched every inch of his flesh. It bubbled within him until it overflowed. He was stuck in a time loop of perpetual agony. He would burn, burn, burn until he was sure he would die from it. When he was at the brink of his tolerance, he would feel the fleeting touch of cold against his face. Inuyasha chased after it in his dreams. He wanted to keep it pressed to the heat of his body, but it would leave as quickly as it appeared. 

The first time that Inuyasha awoke, he was gasping. He was still burning, but the feeling had diminished enough to be bearable. He no longer felt as though his brain was going to boil inside of his skull. With the burning mostly gone, he could focus on the pain that radiated throughout every inch of his body. His hands trembled uselessly at his sides. They shook with such a force that Inuyasha could feel it in his shoulders. He gulped in mouthfuls of air, mouth wide open like he had been drowning. His eyes were open, but unseeing.

His skin was sticky from a thin layer of sweat. He was tired, but he resisted the heavy pull of his eyelids. His body desperately craved the sweet relief of unconsciousness. Inuyasha refused to allow himself to go back under. His mind was crammed full of unvoiced questions about where he was and what was wrong with him. His eyesight was a haze. It was as though a cloudy film had been placed over both eyes. His eyes itched from a dryness that would not dimmish. Each blink of his eyelids simultaneously eased and increased the itch. His eyesight stayed fuzzy despite the constant swipe of his eyelids.

Inuyasha’s limbs tingled like they too had taken a long sleep. It took a great deal of effort to force his leaden arms to rise from their resting place at his sides. He moved his arms sluggishly toward his face. His hands were clumsy in their movements. Inuyasha rubbed at both eyes in unskilled circles. He flinched as his claws brushed against the sensitive skin next to his nose. With a groan, he let his arms go. They flopped back down to his sides. Muted pain shot through his limbs. He cracked his eyes open to assess the status of his vision. His eyesight had somewhat improved. While the fuzziness had gone, he still struggled to see far beyond his face. His eyes began to burn.

Fire crackled near to his left. His ears turned unconsciously towards the sound. It was not dark in the room. He could see the orange glow that the fire was giving off. The warmth of the fire brushed against his body like a gentle touch. He could feel the heat of it, but it wasn’t unpleasant. The heat that had been previously causing him a great deal of discomfort had fled his body to regroup in his head. His eyes only found darkness far above him. The darkness seemed to stretch to great heights. He stared up at it with unfocused eyes, hoping to identify anything. His neck was stiff and painful. He tried to turn his head, but was prevented by a gridlocked tightness in the muscles of his neck.

Inuyasha knew he was missing the top half of his clothing. He didn’t feel the familiar brush of his clothing. He could feel a woven mat beneath his arms. His fingers shakily rubbed against the fibers beneath him. He shrugged his shoulders to see if the texture was uniform. It was. He shuddered at the feel of the hypersensitive skin on his back flexing against the woven soft rush. Staring up at nothing had fatigued his eyes. He finally let them slide completely shut. The soft hum of an ache in the back of his head made itself known.

Inuyasha’s heartbeat was slow in his chest. There was no panic bubbling within him. He was not afraid, despite the fact that he was topless in an unknown location. He lay in complete silence for many moments, listening only to the crackle of the fire and his own even breaths. He had a hazy memory of the events leading up to his loss of consciousness. Every time he tried to grasp onto those memories, they fled from his mind. Eventually, he gave up trying to remember.

Inuyasha became more aware of his surroundings during the moments he spent awake, but with his eyes closed. There was another presence in the room. Inuyasha had no need to immediately open his eyes to identify his brother. Sesshomaru’s youkai was like a storm to his senses. Inuyasha had a suspicion that Sesshomaru had been near for quite some time. He knew that Sesshomaru could tell he was awake. Always one for annoying Sesshomaru, Inuyasha waited until the burning in his eyes eased into an uncomfortable warmth to open them. His vision had improved considerably.

Inuyasha froze, momentarily, with surprise to see his brother leaning over him. He had assumed that the other was merely sitting next to him, not scrutinizing over whatever he was looking at on Inuyasha’s face. Sesshomaru’s face was impassive, but his eyes roamed over Inuyasha’s face. Inuyasha stared back at him. If he had felt well enough, he might have had the sense to be embarrassed by the closeness of their bodies. Instead, he documented the purple of his brother’s eyelids, the markings on his cheeks, the moon on his forehead, the downturn of his lips, and the angle of his sharp nose. Inuyasha’s thoughts moved like sand through an hourglass.

Finally, Sesshomaru’s golden eyes found Inuyasha’s own. Inuyasha stared back. Sesshomaru said nothing. In Inuyasha’s afflicted mind, he figured they were having some sort of staring contest. Inuyasha was determined to win it. He squinted his eyes, trying to outlast Sesshomaru’s searching stare. While Sesshomaru’s eyes betrayed no emotion, his eyebrows were slightly raised as though he was surprised to see Inuyasha staring back at him. Inuyasha wanted to frown. Sesshomaru wasn’t trying to have a staring contest. Though, Inuyasha knew that he would have definitely won the staring contest if it had been real. Inuyasha blinked. The pass of his eyelids was a relief. In the span of a blink, Sesshomaru was no longer leaning over him.

“Am I in hell?” Inuyasha asked, voice scratchy and throat raw. His jaw ached considerably for only saying four words. His tongue rubbed against the back of his top teeth. It felt too large for the confines of his mouth. He entertained the idea of letting it loll out of his mouth. He wondered how offended Sesshomaru would be at the sight.

“Perhaps,” Sesshomaru said in response. His voice, in contrast, was like silk to Inuyasha’s ears. Smooth and deep, the sound of that word repeated in his head for longer than Inuyasha would have ever admitted. Sesshomaru did not elaborate on his statement. He turned away.

While Inuyasha was glad to be released from the scrutiny of Sesshomaru’s gaze, he knew that he needed to ask something. He just couldn’t remember what he needed to ask. Inuyasha’s eyes followed Sesshomaru’s movements as far as his eyes could manage. Sesshomaru didn’t move a great distance away, but his figure had become a blur to Inuyasha’s eyes. Inuyasha scrunched his eyes shut, trying to force his own eyesight to improve. It did not work. Apparently, strength of mind alone was not enough to undo whatever was afflicting his sight.

The heat within his body flared up once again. Inuyasha groaned at the feeling. He stared, unfocused, into the darkness above him. In a moment that was almost agonizing in intensity, Inuyasha thought the heat within him was finally going to engulf him entirely. The feeling passed after a few steady breaths. All that remained was a sharp pain in his stomach.

Sesshomaru’s hand reentered Inuyasha’s frame of vision. Inuyasha focused on it in amazement. There was an underlying current of worry in Inuyasha’s brain. He wondered if Sesshomaru was going to rip out his eyeballs or punch him in the face. Neither of those expertly crafted scenarios came true. Sesshomaru simply pressed the back of his hand to Inuyasha’s forehead with an ease that suggested he had done it every day of his life.

The sensation of Sesshomaru’s cool hand against Inuyasha’s heated skin made him gasp. The difference in temperatures made the muscles in Inuyasha’s body tense up all at once. Excruciating pain exploded in his stomach.

“Ow, ow, fuck,” Inuyasha hissed. He wrenched his head to the side to remove it from Sesshomaru’s grasp. The force of the turn caused his brain to pulsate in his skull. He grabbed at the sides of his head with both hands until the pain in his stomach dulled to an ache.

“Don’t fucking touch me,” he demanded through clenched teeth.

“Cease any unnecessary movements. You are wounded.” Sesshomaru’s voice came in and out of Inuyasha’s head like a wave.

“No shit,” Inuyasha responded.

He refused to look at Sesshomaru. If he looked, he would have to deal with the reality of the situation. He really did not want to do that. He just wanted to _sleep_.

* * *

_Inuyasha rarely dreamed. The topic of his dreams often focused on mundane topics. While it was strange to find himself dreaming, it was bizarre to be actively aware of being within a dream. Inuyasha knew he was dreaming in the same way that a creature was aware of its own life._

_As with most dreams, he had no ailments. His eyesight had returned to normal. Despite the clarity of his vision, the entire area of his dream seemed to be covered in the special sheen that only the dreamworld seemed to possess. He had the sense that he was somewhere important, but he did not know the location._

_Inuyasha was moving. He was not consciously moving his own limbs, yet he walked. His mother was in front of him. He followed her as any child would follow their mother. He knew not of their desired destination. She walked leisurely in front of him. Her black hair swayed side to side with each step. She did not turn to look back at him. She knew he was there._

_She began to walk faster. Inuyasha adjusted his pace to match. His steps were not as broad as he remembered. It took twice as many steps to go half of the distance. His mother sped up to the point where Inuyasha was forced to run to keep up. There were many times when he came close enough to grab at the back of her clothes. His hands reached forward to grasp at the ornate fabric, but it would slip through his grasp at the last second. Still, he kept trying to reach her, to touch her. She was always just beyond his gasp. He ran until the skin of his feet felt raw._

_Only the sound of his feet padding against the stone path met his ears. He listened for the whispers the layers of his mother’s jūnihitoe made as they brushed against each other. He heard nothing._

_“Mother,” he called after her. His voice sounded like an explosion to his ears. His voice sounded similar to that of a child. He stopped running in shock. He stared at his own hands. They were small. He stared down at the rest of himself. His own body had regressed to the size he had been as a young child._

_He looked back up in a panic. He had spent too long staring at himself. The path trailed on before him. It disappeared into a fog some distance ahead. His mother was nowhere to be seen. He began to run again. The path opened up to the flickering image of a courtyard he had played in as a child. He slowed to a stop. Suddenly, his mother was before him in a space where there had been nothing only seconds before. He stared at her back in open fascination. She was so close to him. He stumbled forward. He wanted to be enveloped in her embrace._

_As if sensing his needs, she turned. He felt startled to see her face. It really was her. She looked at him in the same way he had always remembered. She knelt down and gathered him in her arms. He sobbed in her embrace. He repeated her name like a mantra until the fabric beneath his face was wet with his tears._

_“Inuyasha, my darling,” she murmured in his ear. Her fingers slid through his hair. He was comforted by her. He ignored that her body had no warmth. He sank further into her embrace.  
  
“Can you let go, Inuyasha?” She asked him. He tried to pull back to look her in the eye, but she tightened her arms around him. _

_“You don’t want to hug anymore, mother?” Inuyasha whined. He grabbed onto as tightly as he could. She laughed above him. He rubbed his face against her, inhaling her familiar scent. He had almost forgotten the sound of her laugh. He was amazed by how genuine it sounded._

_“Can you let go of the past?”_

* * *

Inuyasha was ripped from the depths of his dream by the feeling of something wet against his eyelids. He blindly tried to grab at whatever it was. His hands were easily captured and moved out of the way.

“Relax, Inuyasha,” Sesshomaru ordered, but his tone lacked the familiar cruelty.

Inuyasha’s eyes were covered with a liquid that had a scent that reminded him of bitter plants. The texture was strange. It was a terrifying mixture of slimy and warm. Inuyasha flinched as more of it was wiped on his eyes.

“I can’t fucking relax when it feels like someone is fucking licking my eyelids,” he complained. It felt like sludge on his eyes, but dried quicker than Inuyasha would have thought. The drying process was almost pleasant. Instead of leaving behind a sticky residue as it dried, it cooled his irritated skin. Once his eyes were almost completely dried, the liquid was applied to his eyes once more. On the second pass, Inuyasha thought about the texture again. He also thought about how Sesshomaru had not responded to his question.

“Are you fucking licking me?” Inuyasha asked, outraged.

“It is medicine.”

“It’s medicinal SPIT?” Inuyasha yelled in disgust. “You’re even more of a freak than I thought.”

A glob of the stuff landed on Inuyasha’s cheek. It was extremely warm. In that moment, it felt a _lot_ like slobber. A wave of nausea rolled through him. He barely had time to turn his head to the side before he was gagging. He had turned in the direction of Sesshomaru.

  
  
“I will end your miserable hanyou life if any of your bodily fluids end up on my person,” Sesshomaru growled. If Inuyasha hadn’t felt so sick, he might have laughed at how alarmed Sesshomaru sounded at the idea of Inuyasha puking on him. Inuyasha almost wanted to throw up on him just to see Sesshomaru’s reaction.

“Prissy bitch,” Inuyasha complained, but turned his head to the other side. His throat spasmed. He gagged, but nothing came out.

Inuyasha couldn’t fully roll onto his side, but he was able to slightly prop himself up onto his right elbow. Tears burned at the corners of his eyes. Each dry-heave made pain shoot through his abdomen. Other than saliva dripping from his open mouth, nothing came up. Inuyasha breathed through his mouth, waiting for the urge to vomit to subside. When he no longer felt ill, he collapsed backwards. Sweat was dripping down his face.

Unconsciously, Inuyasha turned his head towards Sesshomaru. The cooling effect of the medicine was almost completely gone. He opened his eyes to find that his sight had been restored. In amazement, he looked up at Sesshomaru. Sesshomaru sat cross-legged, seemingly bored by Inuyasha’s sudden bout of illness. He was outlined by the soft glow of the fire.

Strangely, Sesshomaru was not wearing his normal suikan or his armor. It was missing from his attire. Instead, he was wearing only the white juban that went beneath it. His sleeves were tied back. He stared at the stripes on both of Sesshomaru’s wrists. The color was vivid against the white skin of Sesshomaru’s forearms. Inuyasha had never seen Sesshomaru in such a state of undress. Sesshomaru was also without his swords.

Inuyasha looked up at Sesshomaru’s face in surprise. He could not understand why he was dressed the way he was. Sesshomaru’s head was angled down to stare at Inuyasha. He was staring right at Inuyasha. Sesshomaru did not respond to Inuyasha’s unasked questions about his current attire. When Inuyasha finally looked away, Sesshomaru’s stare remained.

“What the fuck are you looking at?” Inuyasha asked, but his voice was absent of its normal cockiness. Had Sesshomaru been taking care of him? 

Sesshomaru did not respond.

Unnerved, Inuyasha began to panic. He wanted to get up. Inuyasha’s hands were sweaty and struggled to find purchase on the mat beneath him.

Sesshomaru watched impassively, his only reaction the slow blink of his eyes.

Inuyasha was out of breath by the time he managed to prop himself up on both elbows. His body protested desperately for him to give up. He was proud that he had successfully made it onto his elbows. Unfortunately, he did not have much time to celebrate. His progress was completely undone by Sesshomaru in a matter of seconds.

Inuyasha watched, unable to do anything, as Sesshomaru placed the palm of his hand flat against the middle of Inuyasha’s chest and shoved him hard. Inuyasha’s arms could not hold him. They slid out from beneath him. His back and head collided against the ground with a muted thump.

It was a relatively small distance from his elbows to the ground, but his muscles complained anyways. His stomach began to hurt in earnest again. Luckily, there was no accompanying feeling of nausea. Sesshomaru’s hand still rested on Inuyasha’s sternum, as if he expected Inuyasha to immediately try to sit back up. Instead of removing his hand, Sesshomaru increased the pressure until it prevented Inuyasha from getting a full breath of air. Inuyasha reached up to push uselessly Sesshomaru’s arm.

Sesshomaru’s only outward reaction was to raise an eyebrow at Inuyasha’s struggling, but Inuyasha knew without a doubt that Sesshomaru was feeling smug about the whole encounter. It wasn’t often that Inuyasha was able to be subdued by just a hand.

“You must be patient, Inuyasha,” Sesshomaru chided.

Inuyasha realized the pressure of Sesshomaru’s hand was both a punishment and a warning. Inuyasha nodded his head slowly in response.

Inuyasha sucked in a full breath as soon as the pressure was gone. Although Inuyasha’s breathing was labored, he couldn’t stop the anger building within him. He hissed, “What the fuck is going on, Sesshomaru? Or are you just not going to tell me because you only speak in fucking riddles?”

Sesshomaru’s lip twitched in response. Inuyasha’s face flushed red with anger. Sesshomaru was laughing at him. Inuyasha’s stomach ached, but he wanted to knock that smug look off of Sesshomaru’s face. Inuyasha was too weak to do much but feebly attempt to scratch at Sesshomaru with the claws on the hand closest to him. Sesshomaru easily caught Inuyasha’s wrist. His grip was not hard or even tight. Sesshomaru gently placed Inuyasha’s arm back at his side. Inuyasha followed the movement with his eyes. He then stared at Sesshomaru like he had grown another head.

“You are injured, Inuyasha.” Sesshomaru said simply, as if that explained everything, including the manhandling.

“No shit. You said that already,” Inuyasha retorted. “What obvious thing are you going to tell me next? That there’s a stick stuck up your ass?”

A flash of irritation appeared on Sesshomaru’s face. Inuyasha almost missed it. Inuyasha was filled with the glee at the sight. He felt himself smiling at it. His chapped lips protested the movement. He licked them. He couldn’t believe he had actually irritated Sesshomaru with that comment.

“We have repeated this interaction multiple times,” Sesshomaru responded.

“We have?” Inuyasha frowned. His face contorted into an expression of confused disappointment. If they had repeated the conversation before, that meant that Sesshomaru was frustrated with the situation and not Inuyasha’s witty banter. Inuyasha wished it was possible to double-frown.

“Your insults are repetitive.”

Inuyasha looked away from Sesshomaru to find something interesting to look at above him. He was disappointed for some reason. He stared up into the darkness until his eyes began to close. Sesshomaru shifted beside him, but still Inuyasha refused to look.

* * *

There was something tight wrapping around his stomach. In the haze of sleep, Inuyasha’s mind supplied the image of a snake wrapping around his midsection and squeezing the life out of him. He reached out to grip at the snake. He wrapped both hands around it and began to pull.

“Imbecile,” Sesshomaru hissed, voice sounding suspiciously close to one of Inuyasha’s ears. Inuyasha’s wrists were gripped by strong hands. They didn’t hold hard enough to bruise, but they were tight enough to force Inuyasha to release the gauze-like cloth in his hands. Sesshomaru pressed his arms to the ground with a strength that was bordering on uncomfortable.

By the time Inuyasha’s eyes opened, his wrists were free. He stared in amazement as Sesshomaru adjusted bandages around his waist. The light from the fire was brighter. Sesshomaru seemed to be washed in the red light as he worked. Inuyasha looked down at his own body. Bandages were neatly wrapped around his abdomen, starting from his hips and ending beneath his ribcage. One strand even wrapped around his left shoulder. He wanted to ask Sesshomaru what had happened, but he still couldn’t articulate those words.   
  


So, he asked the first full sentence his foggy brain could think of. “Did you do that?”

Sesshomaru’s gaze snapped to look at him as though he was shocked by the sound of Inuyasha’s voice. He seemed to process Inuyasha’s question a millisecond later. The look he shot at Inuyasha clearly said, _‘and who else could have done it?’_ Sesshomaru returned to adjusting Inuyasha’s bandages. Inuyasha could barely believe what he was seeing. Since when did Sesshomaru help someone? Specifically, when did Sesshomaru start initiating physical contact with Inuyasha?

Inuyasha’s mouth tasted like bitter herbs and the aftertaste of blood. He could barely focus. Any remaining bit of his concentration was zeroed in on Sesshomaru’s movements. He was especially focused on Sesshomaru’s touch. Inuyasha was entranced by the steady movement of Sesshomaru’s hands. Sesshomaru had once impaled Inuyasha through the fucking gut with one of his hands. The same hands that were currently fussing over him and dressing his wounds.

Inuyasha was overcome with a strange mixture of regret and longing. He wanted to express these complicated emotions, but could not. His mind instead focused on what he could remember from before he had ended up in Sesshomaru’s company. It was easier to remember, but the details were still fuzzy. He couldn’t pinpoint a specific time in his recent memory where he actually remembered getting hurt. Nothing had hurt him before he ended up in the well. There was an obvious gap in his memory. He had no memory from the time he was in the water to that moment in the well. How had he ended up there?

“I don’t remember getting hurt.” Inuyasha was surprised by the sound of his own voice. It sounded shaky in his own ears. It was bad enough that Sesshomaru was seeing him in such a state. Inuyasha berated himself for also sounding pitiful as fuck.

Sesshomaru’s touch ghosted over the bandage that wrapped around Inuyasha’s shoulder. Inuyasha stared down at the place he had been touched. He still couldn’t believe that Sesshomaru was actually touching him.

“You were already bearing these wounds when I pulled you from the well,” Sesshomaru said, tone even. He was no longer touching Inuyasha.

“I don’t remember any injuries before the well,” Inuyasha responded in almost a murmur, talking more to himself than Sesshomaru. Inuyasha ran one of his hands through his bangs. They were damp with sweat. Despite the warm temperature of the room, moving his bangs exposed the skin of his forehead to fresh air. It felt good.

Sesshomaru’s eyes followed Inuyasha’s every movement.

Inuyasha inhaled deeply through his nose before immediately regretting it. His sense of smell kicked into overdrive, and he grimaced. Inuyasha could suddenly smell his own blood. The small room was thick with the scent of blood, illness, and sweat. His head began to throb again. He raised the hand at his side to join the other at his head. He rubbed at his eyes with both hands. He had to think about something else. The smell of his blood was overwhelming his ability to think.

“You were weak and disoriented,” Sesshomaru stated, as if that fucking explained away all of Inuyasha’s problems.

“Yeah, and I bet you fucking loved that,” Inuyasha grumbled. While Inuyasha was grateful that Sesshomaru did not leave him to die in the snow, he desperately wished he was literally anyone else. 

  
“I did not.”

Inuyasha removed his hands from his eyes and stared with obvious suspicion at Sesshomaru. Sesshomaru was inspecting Inuyasha’s face with an expression devoid of any emotion. For some reason, Inuyasha had a hard time believing that his brother wasn’t feeling anything. Sesshomaru was probably trying to manipulate him. He reached forward like he was going to touch Inuyasha’s forehead again. Inuyasha smacked at his hand with as much force as he could manage. Inuyasha felt gratified by the noise his hand made when it hit Sesshomaru’s.

“Go away,” Inuyasha demanded. Sesshomaru had gotten too touchy. 

Sesshomaru pulled his hand away. He spared one last glance at Inuyasha’s stomach before standing. Inuyasha thought he was hallucinating. He openly gaped as Sesshomaru moved away. Sesshomaru settled himself on the other side of the fire, next to what appeared to be the opening to the room they were in.

Inuyasha took a look at their surroundings. They were in a cave of some kind. It was a rounded area. The walls were solid stone. When Inuyasha stared upwards, he could not see the top of the cave. The smoke that drifted upwards from the fire went somewhere, but Inuyasha could not tell where. It merely disappeared in the darkness. The only entrance and exit was a large opening next to Sesshomaru. Inuyasha could make out nothing beyond it. There was only darkness.

He was only half-interested in where they were. He was more surprised that Sesshomaru had listened to him. Surely, Sesshomaru had been attacked by brain rotting parasites. He was just being piloted by worms or some shit. There was no way he would act that way normally. Still, Sesshomaru sat in inexpressive contemplation on the opposite side of the room.

Once Inuyasha was certain that Sesshomaru planned to stay away, he attempted to sit again. The hair on the back of Inuyasha’s neck stood. His skin tingled. He knew that Sesshomaru was staring at him with an unwavering gaze as he tried to push himself up. He worried that Sesshomaru was going to come over and knock him down again. Inuyasha paused mid-movement, even though his arms shook from the effort, and waited for Sesshomaru to move. He didn’t.

It took multiple, terrible attempts and a bout of colorful cursing before Inuyasha was able to push himself into an embarrassing excuse for a sitting position. He was hunched over on himself. He was breathing heavily, and his stomach protested with every breath. Beads of sweat rolled down his face from the effort. It was mortifying to hear his own labored breathing magnified in the small room. It was worse knowing that his heartbeat was just as loud.

Inuyasha refused to chance a look at Sesshomaru. Stubbornly, he stared down at his own stomach. A small spot of red began to appear through one of the bandages. He cursed at himself. Tired, he leaned backwards against the wall. The rock was rough, but cold, against his back. It was a comfort for his heated skin. Once Inuyasha’s brain was no longer so hazy with pain, and his breathing had calmed down, he looked at his legs. His hakama were the wrong color. He stared down at them in amazement. He shuddered as the reason for the color change became apparent.

The overwhelming scent of blood was coming from his legs. His hakama were soaked with blood and caked with dirt. His feet were practically covered with dark brown rivers of dried blood. The fresh blood seeping through his bandages combined with the scent of old blood. The smell made Inuyasha dizzy. His head throbbed. The dirt on his knees smelled distinctly of the Bone-Eater’s Well. The memories of the day marched through his head one by one in vivid detail.

“Fuck,” he hissed, disrupting what seemed to be a long stretch of silence. He was making stupid noises that were sure to embarrass him later on, but he couldn’t focus on that. He had other things to focus on, like his injuries, his missing memories, his terrible dreams, and his stupid brother.

Suddenly, Inuyasha was overcome by an urge that demanded he look beneath his bandages. What if he had been attacked by that no-face demon? What if the demon had taken his liver? He leaned forward, curled around his own stomach, and sliced at the spot where the blood was leaking through his bandages. His muscles protested the movement. The skin of his stomach ached and stung like it had been stretched too far.

  
  
“Inuyasha.” Sesshomaru’s voice was sharp from across the cave. Inuyasha knew that Sesshomaru was irritated by his actions, but he couldn’t stop himself. He couldn’t figure out why Sesshomaru was angry at him.

“Ruined anyway,” Inuyasha responded, voice almost dull. It stung when he yanked the bandages away from his wound. Some of the blood had dried the fabric to his stomach. He bared his teeth at Sesshomaru when he heard the other shift.

“Don’t come over here,” he ordered, head snapping up to stare at this brother. He watched Sesshomaru’s every movement. He waited for Sesshomaru’s next move. Inuyasha’s gaze was wild. It dared Sesshomaru to try to interfere. 

Inuyasha’s feral gaze was met head on by Sesshomaru’s unwavering one. His stare was flinty. It made Inuyasha shiver with apprehension. His skin erupted in gooseflesh. The look overwhelmed him. It made him like he was making a terrible mistake. Inuyasha just wanted Sesshomaru to leave him alone. 

“I will remain here,” Sesshomaru stated. “For now.”

Inuyasha tensed at the words. Sesshomaru’s tone conveyed that he was merely placating Inuyasha, not that he was remaining away from him because Inuyasha desired it.

“Still an asshole,” Inuyasha grumbled under his breath. His eyes fell from Sesshomaru’s figure to stare down at his own stomach. He could feel Sesshomaru watching him, but he steeled himself. He had to see his injury. He sawed at the bandages carefully with his claws. His hands shook. He feared accidentally sticking his fingers into the wound.

Once the top layer was satisfactorily torn, Inuyasha grabbed a tattered edge and began to unwind it. His body complained as he twisted and turned. He removed layer by layer of the fabric. Each uncovered layer was darker than the previous. The smell of new and old blood was making him lightheaded. Black spots filled his vision. He shook them away. 

Triumph filled him when he finally began to remove the final layer. Any satisfaction that Inuyasha may have felt at seeing beneath the bandages died in his throat. The gash that lay beneath was long and jagged. It spanned from one hip to the other. A trickle of fresh blood dripped from the upper edge of the wound. Had he been gutted? The smell of infected flesh had him turning his head away. Nausea flared to life within his stomach. Bile rose in the back of his stomach.

Swallowing, Inuyasha stared back down. The skin around the wound was stained a mixture of angry red and fresh pink. The splotches of red housed nearly-faded black lines that appeared to be reaching outwards. Patches of new pink skin bordered the section of the wound that appeared to be trying to close. Inuyasha almost wanted to rub his fingers against it, to experience the sting of hypersensitivity he knew was there.

Despite the pain from the injury, the blood, and the glares he was receiving from his brother, Inuyasha was relieved to know that his wound did not seem to match the gaping hole that had been left in the woman and the hunter. He could not see his own organs, but a worry whispered through his mind that maybe his enhanced healing had hidden them from view.

Inuyasha could admit in the back of his head that he had indeed made a mistake. He would have never admitted that to Sesshomaru. He had reopened some of the places that had been healing. He grabbed some of the discarded bandages and pressed an acceptably clean section to his stomach. It was bleeding in earnest again. He needed to ask Sesshomaru if he had all of his organs. He raised his head, and fixed Sesshomaru with a look that he hoped was determined. Sesshomaru met Inuyasha’s look with a tepid one of his own.

  
“Sesshomaru,” Inuyasha stated, trying to put all of his confidence into the pronunciation of his brother’s name. Sesshomaru stared at him silently. Inuyasha faltered at the sight of Sesshomaru’s once expressionless eyes glowing with barely contained rage. Inuyasha waited for Sesshomaru to either say something or attack him. He did neither. Inuyasha was pinned by the anger in Sesshomaru’s eyes. It unnerved him more than he thought it would. Why was Sesshomaru pissed at him?

“Was I missing my liver?” Inuyasha finally said after what felt like ages. Any sense of confidence or bravado had left Inuyasha in that moment, leaving his voice a squeaky whisper.  
  


“Liver?” Sesshomaru repeated like the word was foreign in his mouth. His stare was unwavering. Inuyasha wished he was dealing with literally anyone else. Sesshomaru continued, “The wound was not so deep as to reveal your organs.”

Inuyasha’s sigh of relief seemed to surprise Sesshomaru because his anger flickered for a moment. Inuyasha sagged backwards against the hard rock. He was dizzy. The pressure he was applying to his wound was uneven at best. The memory of having that woman hold her own bandages as she died appeared in Inuyasha’s head. He entertained the idea of falling asleep despite the uncomfortable position he was in.

Another thought came to him that had him sitting up once more. The urgency had his adrenaline pumping. It dulled the pain that shot through him.

“Was I smiling?” Inuyasha asked, tone insistent. He wondered if Sesshomaru could sense the fear behind his words. He hoped that Sesshomaru wouldn’t demand an explanation of Inuyasha’s question.

Sesshomaru’s head tilted in question while his eyes narrowed with suspicion. All of the muscles in his body seemed to be tensed up at once, like he was physically resisting the urge to return to Inuyasha’s side. After a moment, Sesshomaru shook his head in the negative.

“You did find the sight of your own blood to be particularly amusing,” Sesshomaru stated.

“Oh,” Inuyasha responded. He was lucky that Sesshomaru hadn’t questioned him further. His cheeks were flushed with embarrassment. He had remembered laughing, but he had convinced himself it was another dream. He could remember the sound of his own twisted laughter in his ears. As if hearing it again, his ears pressed against his skull. He still wondered about the demon without a face, but maybe his injuries had nothing to do with it. 

“You were in a state of delirium,” Sesshomaru added. His tone was strange, like he was suggesting that Inuyasha was _still_ delirious.

Inuyasha grunted a noise in response. He carefully leaned his aching body back against the wall. The tendrils of exhaustion had gripped him again. He focused on his own breathing. He watched shadows dance on the ground. His hands began to feel sticky. His tongue darted out to lick at his bottom lip. The strangeness of the situation stood out to him once more. 

“Is this truly the future?” He asked, but he knew the answer. 

The old Sesshomaru would have let him die.

“Yes,” Sesshomaru said.

Inuyasha found it suddenly hard to breathe. His eyes were stinging with unshed tears. He wanted to know if his friends were still alive, but he couldn’t bring himself to ask. His position against the wall had become suspiciously more comfortable despite the jagged edges of stone that were digging into his spine. Darkness was gathering at the corners of his eyes. He knew closing them for any longer than a blink would cause him to slip into unconsciousness.

He forced his mouth to move, to begin asking all of the questions bubbling within his head about the future. However, he was distracted before he could ask the question on his tongue. His mouth moved, but no sound came out. The scent of his blood was getting stronger. He knew it was leaking from his wound. His hands were damp. Inuyasha refused to look down at them. Instead, he stared at Sesshomaru through the hazy air above the fire.

“Why isn’t it healing?” He asked, voice low and unsteady.

“Poison,” Sesshomaru replied, tone seeming to take on a sense of urgency. He was up on his feet in a moment. He came around the fire, but stopped a few inches from Inuyasha’s body. He neither attempted to touch him nor settled himself at Inuyasha’s side.

Inuyasha looked up at him in question.

“I must attend to your injury,” he said carefully, as if speaking to a frightened child.

“Fuck no. I’m fine,” Inuyasha responded, pressing the clump of bandages harder against his stomach. The blood had begun to seep through the layers. Inuyasha’s fingers were sticky and warm with it. The idea of using his blood to attack Sesshomaru was at the forefront of his mind. Inuyasha pressed his back harder into the rock instead.

“Inuyasha.” Sesshomaru’s voice was devoid of whatever pleasantries he had been previously extending to Inuyasha. He moved to stand near one of Inuyasha’s legs. The toes of his boots almost touched Inuyasha’s thigh.

“You will let me,” he demanded, his voice taking on a low growl.

Inuyasha’s ears flattened in response. The fight fled his body. The tenseness in his muscles released suddenly, and he sagged against the wall. Although he had been resistant moments before, he found himself unable, or maybe unwilling, to say no.

“Fine,” Inuyasha stated, giving in. He felt stupid. Twin smudges of red appeared on his cheeks. He wanted to analyze his own reaction to Sesshomaru’s stupid growling, but he was too exhausted.

Sesshomaru knelt. Inuyasha found himself staring at Sesshomaru’s thighs. His eyes traced the splatters of blood on his clothing. The blood on Sesshomaru belonged to Inuyasha. Sesshomaru’s long fingers wrapped around one of Inuyasha’s wrists. Sesshomaru’s other hand expertly began to pry Inuyasha’s fingers open one by one. He then removed the bandages from Inuyasha’s hand. His grip was soft as he guided Inuyasha’s arm to rest at his side. He then repeated the process on Inuyasha’s other hand.

The smell of blood, intense despite the frequency of its appearance, filled Inuyasha’s nose. He choked on the smell. Sesshomaru’s eyes flicked from where they had been lingering on Inuyasha’s wound to rest for a second on his face. He dropped the bloodied bandages in a heap behind him. Inuyasha didn’t resist as Sesshomaru pulled him forward off the wall by his shoulders. His hands were cold against the skin of Inuyasha’s shoulders. Inuyasha shivered. His skin was burning again.

Sesshomaru’s hands remained at Inuyasha’s shoulders, as if waiting to see if Inuyasha could hold his own weight. Inuyasha stayed upright for the most part when Sesshomaru finally released him. Inuyasha watched, mystified, as Sesshomaru began to wrap his torso with clean bandages. Each wrap of the bandage forced Sesshomaru’s hands to brush against the sensitive skin on the insides of Inuyasha’s arms.

“You carry bandages around with you?” Inuyasha asked.

Sesshomaru paused his methodical wrapping of Inuyasha’s wound. He seemed to be thinking.

“Yes,” he responded. He returned to the task at hand. Inuyasha thought he had heard a softness to Sesshomaru’s voice.

Inuyasha became entranced watching Sesshomaru’s movements. His neck protested as the weight of his head became too heavy to support. Inuyasha’s head and body slumped forward. His forehead connected with Sesshomaru’s chest. Sesshomaru froze beneath Inuyasha.

Inuyasha inhaled deeply. Sesshomaru’s scent had overpowered the smell of blood. Inuyasha felt drunk on it. He couldn’t deny that the smell was pleasant. He made no attempt to get away from Sesshomaru.

After a moment, Sesshomaru continued to wrap Inuyasha’s torso. Sesshomaru’s movements were no longer as fluid due to the new position, but he did not push Inuyasha away. He continued on as if it was completely normal for Inuyasha to be pressed against him.

The pain in Inuyasha’s stomach lessened in intensity as the pressure of the bandages increased. Even the pain that radiated through the rest of his body seemed to get a little better. He let his eyes slide closed.

* * *

Inuyasha cycled through periods of painful wakefulness and fitful sleep. He had no control over when his body would sleep. He would often dream, but he could rarely recall the subject of those dreams once he was awake. The only constant of this terrible cycle was Sesshomaru. Inuyasha had come to expect that Sesshomaru would be in close proximity whenever he regained consciousness.

The situation changed each time Inuyasha awoke, but Sesshomaru was always there. Sesshomaru did strange things for him. There would be times when Inuyasha would wake to find himself propped up with his back against Sesshomaru’s chest. Sesshomaru would press a bowl to Inuyasha’s lips and would force him to drink the contents of it. The substance in the bowl varied each time. Inuyasha could remember water, a salty broth, and a bitter, chalky liquid that Inuyasha absolutely hated. Sesshomaru had resorted to gripping Inuyasha by the bottom jaw and painfully forcing him to open his mouth to get him to drink the last one.

When Inuyasha would awaken on his own, he would initiate conversations with Sesshomaru. Inuyasha could only remember a handful of the fevered conversations he had with Sesshomaru. While the ones he could remember weren’t inherently embarrassing, Inuyasha worried he had strayed into strange topics of conversation when he was at his most disoriented. There seemed to be a patience to this Sesshomaru that Inuyasha had never seen before. A strange feeling would build within Inuyasha whenever he thought too much about Sesshomaru’s motivations.

Would Inuyasha have given Sesshomaru the same level of care if their positions were reversed? Inuyasha wasn’t sure. He wondered if he would end up owing something to Sesshomaru for saving his life.

A nightmare gripped Inuyasha by the throat and threw him back into the world of wakefulness. Inuyasha’s hands came to press at his own throat. He lay with his heart thudding in his chest. He took deep breaths to slow the speed of his heart. He worried that it might burst from the confines of his ribcage. Inuyasha tried to yank the dream from the confines from his memory, but he couldn’t remember a single thing about it.

Just like every other time he had awoken, Sesshomaru was sitting beside him. He didn’t question Inuyasha’s nightmares, and Inuyasha was glad for that.

“What will I owe you?” Inuyasha managed to ask after he calmed down enough to breathe normally. He figured it was time to ask.

Sesshomaru did not answer, but met Inuyasha’s gaze full on. Inuyasha knew Sesshomaru wouldn’t verbally ask Inuyasha to elaborate. He acted as though he expected everyone around him to read his mind or something.

“For helping me, fucker,” Inuyasha responded, feeling like the question was obvious.

Sesshomaru broke his gaze to stare at the subjugation beads around Inuyasha’s neck. He didn’t respond.

“You could just admit that you don’t know, asshole,” Inuyasha muttered under his breath. Sesshomaru did not respond to that either.

Sesshomaru’s eyes appeared to be taking in every single detail of the beads. His eyes looked almost glassy. It was as though he had disappeared inside of his head. For some reason, seeing it caused Inuyasha to feel like he was being slowly sliced open.

“Are you sure you’re really him?” Inuyasha asked. This was not the same Sesshomaru he had grown to know.

Sesshomaru’s eyes returned to normal at a speed that suggested he had been thrown back into his body. The force with which he turned his head to stare at Inuyasha made his perfectly straight hair flutter. Inuyasha watched it move in a daze.

“Do you doubt my identity?”

“You haven’t exactly picked me up by my throat recently,” Inuyasha deadpanned. “You’ve taken care of my injuries. Sesshomaru would not do that.”

“You know nothing of my motivations,” Sesshomaru responded.

He was right, of course. Inuyasha knew nothing of what Sesshomaru would earn from helping him. He knew nothing of Sesshomaru because this was not the same brother he had interacted with before. The truth of it filled Inuyasha with fear. He didn’t want to deal with the complexities of the situation, so he focused on something else.

“Where the fuck are we?” Inuyasha asked, loudly. His ears twitched as the sound of his voice echoed back at him.

“A cave.” Sesshomaru gave no indication that he was surprised by the swift change in subject. 

“Obviously we’re in a fucking cave.” At least some things were consistent, this Sesshomaru was still an asshole.

“Hn.”

“Fuck, fine. Why are we in a cave?” Inuyasha questioned, irritated. Sesshomaru was the worst conversationalist.

“Your health was declining. It was not possible to make it to my home.” The distinction between house and _home_ rang in Inuyasha’s ears.

“You live somewhere?” Inuyasha asked, eyes narrowing in suspicion.

Sesshomaru stared at him in response.   
  
“Like you’ve ever fucking told me anything that didn’t have to do with how worthless I am,” Inuyasha retorted.

“I returned to father’s territory some years ago,” Sesshomaru said simply, as if that explained everything from the dawn of time until the present.

Inuyasha scrunched his nose up in disgust. He scoffed, “Let me guess. Dad had a big kingdom that you didn’t want to rule? And now you do?”

It was ridiculous how easy Sesshomaru’s life had been. Inuyasha had suffered and suffered. It was hard not to let bitterness entangle all of his thoughts.

“Yes. I had neglected my responsibilities for too long.” Sesshomaru said, eyes no longer focused on Inuyasha. Inuyasha contemplated the meaning behind the far off look on Sesshomaru’s face. He thought to ask about Sesshomaru’s _responsibilities_. He thought to ask about many things, but couldn’t vocalize any of them. Sesshomaru’s focus was back on Inuyasha. Inuyasha shrunk a bit under the gaze. Inuyasha had never seen a look of such stubbornness on Sesshomaru’s face.

“Including you,” Sesshomaru continued.

“I ain’t your responsibility, asshat.”

“You are.” There was a steel in Sesshomaru’s voice that made Inuyasha shudder. “I purposefully neglected you for years.”

  
Inuyasha opened his mouth to object, but Sesshomaru interrupted him.

“Quiet, Inuyasha,” he ordered with a force that surprised Inuyasha. Sesshomaru’s presence seemed to grow in the room.

Inuyasha’s mouth snapped closed with a force that made his jaw ache. His ears pressed backwards.

“The error of my ways became apparent to me on the day you disappeared. 100 years have passed since then. Failure is not an option, Inuyasha.” Sesshomaru’s voice had deepened. He spoke Inuyasha’s name with a growl.

The sound made Inuyasha feel anxious. The urge to roll over and show his neck like some sort of bitch was strong. Inuyasha thought he would rather cook and his eat his own hand than show any sort of deference to the King of Ice before him.

“Just because you decided to pull your head out of your ass long enough to realize other people exist does not mean that I have to do anything you say,” Inuyasha said. His voice remained calm, but tremors began to wrack through his body.

Inuyasha had realized that Sesshomaru had finally told him exactly how long he had been gone. It had been 100 years? His brows furrowed as he tried to understand. His friends were surely dead. They had to have been dead for some time. He would never see Sango, Miroku, or Kaede ever again. The humans he had known in the village were gone. In his immense sorrow, he even thought about Sango and Miroku’s children, who had most likely lived full lives and were already dead.

  
“My friends are dead,” he said, voice wavering. Tears had gathered at the corner of his eyes. “I’ll never see them again.”

“Inuyasha,” Sesshomaru called, voice cutting through Inuyasha’s misery. Unfortunately, beneath that misery was unbridled rage.

“You mean nothing to me,” Inuyasha said, lashing out. “I would die one thousand deaths to be reunited with my friends. I would kill myself to get away from you. You should have let me die in the well.” The microscopic amount of shock on Sesshomaru’s face should have made Inuyasha happy, but he felt nothing. Inuyasha collapsed back against the ground, rolled to face the wall, and drowned himself in his own misery.

* * *

He awoke in the position he had fallen asleep in. He had hoped he would never wake up again. Unfortunately, life continued despite Inuyasha’s wishes. The pain in his stomach had improved. He was healing. He found no joy in the discovery. He wanted to remain miserable for the rest of his life. Inuyasha promised himself that he would never move from that specific spot.

Inuyasha’s resolve did not last as long as he hoped. The bandages around his waist pulled uncomfortably whenever he moved. If he hadn’t slept through worse, he would have been surprised by the fact that he slept in that position. With a sigh, he rolled onto his back. The movement drew Inuyasha’s attention to the emptiness at his neck. Something was missing. When his hand moved to touch his throat, he found an empty space instead of what he was looking for. The beads were gone. He sat up quickly, wincing as he did.

Sesshomaru was sitting on the other side of the fire. Inuyasha couldn’t focus on his anger, his pain, or even his despair. Instead, he stared at the beads hanging from Sesshomaru’s fingertips. How had Sesshomaru taken them off of Inuyasha’s neck?   
  
“Give those back, asshole.” Inuyasha scrambled around to try to stand up. Sesshomaru’s eyes found Inuyasha’s. The look Sesshomaru shot Inuyasha froze his limbs.

“Tell me what happened the day you left,” Sesshomaru commanded. His voice was full of ice.

Inuyasha shuddered at the sound of it.

“Give me the beads back,” he tried again. He did not want to speak of that day. He wanted the beads. He wanted his friends. He wanted to go back to sleep.

  
  
Sesshomaru didn’t respond. Sesshomaru instead chose to stare at Inuyasha with such an intensity that eventually made Inuyasha cave because he was so creeped out. He told Sesshomaru the entire story. He left out a lot of minor details, like the times he crept around spying on Sesshomaru, and all of the time he spent at the well. He avoided speaking of his friends. Sesshomaru was uninterested in talk about humans. Additionally, Inuyasha didn’t think he could speak their names knowing they were dead. Sesshomaru appeared bored with Inuyasha’s retelling until Inuyasha began to speak of the no-face demon. Sesshomaru leaned closer slightly as if that part was particularly interesting. When Inuyasha spoke of the water, he left out the subject of his reflection.

“What did you see?” Sesshomaru, ever the vigilant bastard, asked. 

  
Inuyasha shrugged as nonchalantly as he could. “I saw my friends,” he said, hoping Sesshomaru would fall for it. While Inuyasha did not try to get up to take the beads, he did hold his hand out in question.

“What purpose do these beads hold?” Sesshomaru did not move to return them to Inuyasha. He must have seen the benefit of the beads as a bargaining tool. It wasn’t like Inuyasha could physically take them back.

Inuyasha huffed out a breath, and dropped his hand to his side. He tried to keep the frustration out of his voice, but failed miserably. “You’ve seen it in action before. No idea why you’re so fucking interested now. It would throw me to the ground.”

  
  
“I do have doubts about the effectiveness of this necklace.”

  
  
“I mean it was effective. It hurt like hell,” Inuyasha scoffed in response. Memories of his body colliding with the earth filled his head. Those memories brought images of Kagome to the forefront of his mind. He scrunched his eyes shut. It was the only place he could see her now. He added, “I was stupid a lot, so I deserved it.”

“Hn.”

Suddenly, Inuyasha felt the familiar itch of anxiety crawling up his spine. He shuddered and wrenched open his eyes. He wanted to reach forward and rip the beads from Sesshomaru’s hands despite the large space between them. Even though he despised what the beads could do, they were his. Kagome had placed them on his neck. The absence of their weight made Inuyasha feel like he was going to choke.

“Give it back,” he ordered, but the order was almost embarrassing. His voice had no bite behind it.

“Will you behave?”

  
  
Inuyasha’s face flushed at the question. He didn’t know what Sesshomaru meant by the word ‘behave’, but Inuyasha would say whatever would get him what he wanted. He grimaced, feeling like a child.

“Yes,” he finally bit out. He refused to look up at Sesshomaru as he approached. He didn’t want to give him the satisfaction.

“You’ve decided to be truthful,” Sesshomaru said.

  
  
Inuyasha whipped his head up at the comment. The room was dim. Sesshomaru’s face was shadowed above him.

“I’ve been telling the truth the entire time, fuck face,” Inuyasha responded. He tried to bring his voice down enough to mimic the growl he had heard earlier from Sesshomaru. It was almost embarrassing how terrible it sounded in his own ears.

  
  
Sesshomaru did not taunt him, but he also did not immediately return the beads to Inuyasha. Instead, in a motion that felt suspiciously un-Sesshomaru, he crouched down in front of Inuyasha. The movement sent Inuyasha reeling back into the hard rock. Sesshomaru was suddenly too close to him. Inuyasha had to sit cross-legged to avoid touching Sesshomaru with his legs. He couldn’t pull his knees to his chest or risk the damage to his stomach.

Sesshomaru held out the arm Inuyasha had once chopped off. The beads dangled from his hand. Inuyasha stared, but did not reach out to snatch them. This Sesshomaru was both older and faster than the brother that Inuyasha was familiar with. Inuyasha wasn’t in prime enough condition to play a game of keep-away. Inuyasha’s hands twitched in his lap. He didn’t understand the Sesshomaru in front of him. He almost longed for the one that tried to kill him. That Sesshomaru, at least, was transparent with how much he hated Inuyasha’s existence. 

“Inuyasha,” Sesshomaru murmured. Inuyasha’s ears twitched at the sound of his name. He looked up, and managed to make eye contact with the other man for approximately 5 seconds before his eyes diverted and landed on one of the marks on Sesshomaru’s cheek. Sesshomaru, apparently, really liked eye contact. He also liked to say his name. He seemed to say it whenever he could.

Inuyasha almost longed for the insults.

Sesshomaru moved, like someone dealing with a frightened animal, and gripped one of Inuyasha’s hands. Inuyasha flinched. He barely resisted the urge to yank his hand from his brother’s grip. There wasn’t much he could do. His back was flush with the cave wall. Inuyasha couldn’t win. He was injured and weak. He also couldn’t win mentally. He was startled when Sesshomaru, with a grip that was almost too gentle, flipped his hand over. Inuyasha stared down at his own upturned palm. The skin of Sesshomaru’s hand was soft.

Sesshomaru let the beads pool in the palm of Inuyasha’s hand. The cold beads felt like a lifeline. Once they were safely within his grasp, Inuyasha clenched his hand around them. He wasn’t going to let go of them without a fight this time. When Sesshomaru didn’t immediately release his hand, Inuyasha yanked his own out of the other’s grasp. Inuyasha held the beads in both hands. He rubbed each individual bead between his forefinger and thumb.   
  


Sesshomaru stood without comment. Before Sesshomaru moved to return to the other side of the room, he placed his hand on the top of Inuyasha’s head. It had been only a quick touch, but it bothered Inuyasha more than the hand contact or all of the other contact they had combined. Inuyasha swallowed around what felt like a knot in his throat. He wanted to cry once again. Everyone he knew was dead. Even this Sesshomaru wasn’t the same as the one before. He couldn’t even find comfort in a Sesshomaru who despised him. Instead, he had to deal with one who seemed to have watered the shriveled excuse for a heart that he carried around.

The ache in Inuyasha’s stomach reminded him again of his predicament. He knew it would continue to heal with time, but time spent healing meant time spent with a brother that Inuyasha didn’t know and couldn’t predict.

Sesshomaru was sitting on the other side of the fire. He was looking at Inuyasha over the flames. It had taken some time for Inuyasha to blink back burning tears. He had refused to look up at Sesshomaru until he knew he wouldn’t cry.

“Rest, Inuyasha.”

“Don’t tell me what to do,” Inuyasha growled in response. Internally, he groaned at his choice of words. Was that really all he could come up with?

Sesshomaru looked almost amused by his response.

Inuyasha hated the way Sesshomaru regarded him with silence. Inuyasha felt an almost desperation for communication grip him. He already missed the easy conversations he used to have with his friends. If he was truly stuck in a world where only his brother remained, he needed to be able to communicate with him. Inuyasha felt nauseous at the thought.

They were stuck together. An amalgamation of two very different personalities.

“How the fuck can anyone stand you?” Inuyasha hissed.

Sesshomaru did not respond, just like Inuyasha had expected. He wanted to reach over and rip that emotionless look from the other man’s face.

Inuyasha breathed out heavily through his nose. He was left alone with Sesshomaru. Time travel was not something that Inuyasha was unfamiliar with, but it had happened frequently enough for its reoccurrence to be strange. Inuyasha had traveled back and forth through the well before. His chest throbbed where the sacred arrow had pierced it. Fifty years had passed by him in an instant.

Again, he was dealing with a jump in time that had not aged him. He couldn’t think of it for too long or it would make him sink into a puddle of misery. He wanted to be free from the grip of time. He wanted to control it. He wanted to go backwards to the days before. He desperately missed his friends. He yearned for those days spent at the well. He thought about what to do, but the answer to his time debacle was not readily available. Sesshomaru didn’t appear to be bursting with information either.

After some time, Sesshomaru stood and moved to the door.

“Will you behave?” Sesshomaru asked Inuyasha, turning from where he was standing. 

  
  
Inuyasha huffed, “What, am I some sort of baby or something? I’m an adult.” He threw the term baby back at Sesshomaru.   
  


The look Sesshomaru gave him in response made him uncomfortable. Inuyasha scratched at his chin and made a show of thinking about Sesshomaru’s question.

“Yeah. I’ll behave,” he responded, knowing Sesshomaru wouldn’t believe what he said anyway.

  
  
“I’ll return shortly. Inuyasha, remain here.” Sesshomaru’s voice had hardened. It seemed to Inuyasha like the other was trying to drill into his brain through his eyeballs from how intently Sesshomaru was staring at him. Inuyasha’s stomach flipped. There was a weird feeling in his head. It urged him to do what he was told.   
  
_Whatever._  
  


Luckily for Inuyasha, Sesshomaru didn’t force him to respond. Sesshomaru tilted his head at him in what was obviously the bastard’s sorry excuse of a goodbye. Inuyasha watched his figure disappear into the darkness. His original plan had involved waiting for an acceptable amount of time before following Sesshomaru. The plan changed when the tendrils of sleep gripped him and dragged him into a dream.

_He had returned to the place he had seen his mother. The courtyard was gone. She was gone. He looked around for her. His body had returned to its normal size. He was glad for that. Running with little legs was fucking annoying. He turned in a circle in hopes of identifying anything around him._

_A voice called his name from the mist. He couldn’t prevent his feet from moving again. He could see the figure in the distance. A figure of darkness danced before him. He ran forward._

_“Please, stop,” he cried out after the figure. His stomach burned with a renewed pain, like the running had ripped it open. He wanted the pain to end. He grew closer to the figure. He opened his mouth to call for his mother._

_It wasn’t her._

_He slowed to almost a stop._

_Kikyo was before him. He could see her, but he couldn’t smell her. She looked as she had when she was alive. Beautiful._

_Her eyes sparkled when she saw him._

_She smiled._

_He rushed to her._

_“Kikyo,” he breathed, gathering her into his arms. She sagged against him. The warmth of her body carved into his. He pressed his cheek to the top of her head. He wanted to breathe in her scent, but there was nothing._

_“Become human, Inuyasha. Live a human life with me.” Her voice was the same, but there was a tinniness to it._

_“What?” He asked. His mind though of Kagome, who had wanted him as he was._

_Kikyo’s grip on him tightened until it was unbearable. When Inuyasha finally thought that the pressure would kill him, she shoved him away._

_“You did this, Inuyasha. You did this,” she cried, hand gripping her bloody shoulder. His nose twitched. The air was thick with blood. He stared at her in horror._

_“I did it,” he said. His jaw moved as though it was pulled by strings._

_“You did this,” she repeated, backing away from him. The bottom of her miko attire was on fire._

_Everything began to burn. The fog morphed into flames all around him._

_Kikyo was gone._

_Inuyasha sank to his knees. The flames grew larger. They lapped at the edges of the path like water to the shore._

_It was hot. His skin felt like it had been peeled off._

_It hurts, he thought. He gripped at his chest and pulled at the cloth covering it. It was hot. It was so hot. He was burning from the inside. It was going to overwhelm him._

* * *

Sesshomaru was still gone when Inuyasha finally pulled himself from the grip of his nightmare. His face burned hot with illness. The haze from before had returned to torture his mind. Despite the heat in his head, his body was so very cold. The fire in the middle of the room had diminished to embers. A darkness had come over the room. He could barely see. Confused, he got to his feet. 

Inuyasha went to the opening of the cave. Sesshomaru was surely hiding something. Or, he thought, Sesshomaru had gotten bored of him and left him to die. Inuyasha went forward and ignored the nagging in his head that told him to remain where he was. He tried to follow Sesshomaru’s scent, but there was nothing. He could see, but it was a stretch. He stumbled through dirt and rocks. The cave did not open to the outside air. They were in a system of caves. Not just one cave.

He was freezing.

He continued moving for as long as he could. He listened intently for any clues. Only the sounds of his labored breathing greeted him. He sniffed for Sesshomaru’s scent, but there was nothing. The walking had returned some of the warmth to his body. His face remained on fire. His abdomen cramped in pain as he walked. The bandages pulled on his skin and his wound.

“Fuck,” he hissed. He tried to place his hand on the hilt of his sword, but there was nothing there. He had left it behind. He couldn’t even remember the last time he had seen it. 

He glanced between the two openings in the rock. Both were large enough to walk through. He could only see darkness. 

He rushed through one side. 

Inuyasha realized quickly that he had made a mistake. This system of caves was much more vast than Inuyasha had realized. He couldn’t feel any Youkai energy. The feeling that had been nagging him to stay where Sesshomaru had left him was getting decidedly worse. He wasn’t _afraid_. He was just tired. Maybe it was better to go back and wait for Sesshomaru’s pompous ass.

Except he had no idea where he was. 

He began to inch backwards, until he collided with a solid body.

“Inuyasha.”

Fortunately, or unfortunately, he backed into the very demon he had been looking for. He turned around slowly. Sesshomaru was there. While Inuyasha could barely make anything out in the low lighting, he could see that Sesshomaru's eyes were shining with barely restrained anger. He was livid.

“Imbecile,” Sesshomaru growled. He grabbed Inuyasha’s right wrist, and yanked him closer until they were almost chest to chest. He held Inuyasha’s arm above him at an impossible angle.

“Do you lose your ability to think whenever you become a human, little brother?” Sesshomaru’s face was inches from his. Inuyasha could not escape his look or the grip on his wrist. He could feel the warmth of Sesshomaru’s breath on his face.

Human? He froze from where he was desperately trying pry Sesshomaru’s iron grip off of his wrist. Was he human? He looked down at himself. Black hair. His bangs were dark in front of his eyes. He had to squint to see, but his hand had rounded nails. Oh, _fuck_. He was so fucking stupid. He began to struggle in earnest to escape Sesshomaru’s grasp.

It was the new moon. He was completely human. Sesshomaru knew his secret. He had to get away. He tried to kick out with a bare foot. Sesshomaru merely moved his own leg out of the way. Inuyasha was stronger than the average human, but he was no match for Sesshomaru. Especially considering he was very seriously wounded. Still, he tried.

Sesshomaru let out a noise of pure exasperation and released Inuyasha’s wrist. In any other situation, Inuyasha would have been ecstatic to hear that noise. He had no real time to think about it or to even escape. Sesshomaru learned forward and swept Inuyasha up into his arms. Pain burned through Inuyasha’s stomach. He pressed a hand against it in hopes of easing some of the ache.

Sesshomaru was _literally_ holding him. One arm was wrapped around Inuyasha’s upper back. The other was underneath his knees. 

  
“Put me down, you fuck,” Inuyasha screeched. He struggled in Sesshomaru’s grasp. “I am not a woman. You shouldn’t fucking carry me like a wo-“

In response, Sesshomaru loosened his grip slightly. Inuyasha felt himself begin to slide through his grasp. He scrambled, leaned forward, and locked his arms around Sesshomaru’s neck. It slowed his descent towards the ground. Sesshomaru adjusted his grip. He then began to walk. 

Inuyasha shook in Sesshomaru’s arms. He had been afraid before, but this bordered on ridiculous. Inuyasha’s body hurt terribly. He almost wished Sesshomaru would kill him quickly. The darkness was ominous, but he preferred that to whatever was going on with his brother. 

“I have no intention of harming you. You are still weak. Your human form is incredibly vulnerable. But you’re aware of your own limitations, aren’t you?” Sesshomaru paused mid-step to speak to Inuyasha. He leaned down, placing his face uncomfortably close to Inuyasha’s. Inuyasha knew it was purely for his own benefit. He wanted Inuyasha to see how angry he was.

Inuyasha wanted to punch him. 

Under Sesshomaru’s scrutiny, Inuyasha squirmed. He nodded like an idiot. Why was he so fucking weak right now? He never acted this way. He needed to fight and get away, but he couldn’t. Sesshomaru was much stronger than he was. Plus, he was pissed off. 

When they didn’t immediately start moving again, Inuyasha realized Sesshomaru was waiting for a verbal response. “Yes,” he snapped.

Although Sesshomaru seemed displeased with his response, he continued walking. Much to Inuyasha’s chagrin, he also kept fucking _talking_.

“A large majority of the poison flowing in your veins has gone, but enough remains to keep your human form incredibly ill,” he said. "Your symptoms will get worse."   
  


Inuyasha tried to ignore the heat that radiated from the strong arms wrapped around his shoulders and knees. Sesshomaru’s body was putting off a lot of heat. Inuyasha was in pain, freezing, and dizzy. His brain began to short-circuit. His arms were stuck in an uncomfortable position locked around Sesshomaru’s neck. He couldn’t let go. He didn’t want Sesshomaru to drop him. The pain distracted him from the heat of Sesshomaru’s neck and the way his hair swayed as he moved, brushing soft strands over Inuyasha’s interlocked fingers. Inuyasha rested his head between his arms.

“You are thick with the scent of pain.”

Inuyasha wanted to scoff, but grimaced instead. Although Sesshomaru was acting suspiciously careful, being carried alone was painful enough. 

“Someone has definitely taken control of your brain,” Inuyasha grumbled against his own arm. He couldn't focus too much on Sesshomaru or his motivations. They continued the rest of the walk in silence. 

Inuyasha thought he would have been more excited to finally see the room once more. He wasn't very excited at all. The room was brighter than it had been. He wanted to shut his eyes and sleep. He tried to squirm within Sesshomaru’s grasp. He wanted let down immediately. Sesshomaru was warm, but Inuyasha was still freaked out. 

They stood in the opening of the room. Sesshomaru was staring at Inuyasha's face with a gaze that was tinged with disappointment.

Inuyasha moved his head back as far as he could in his current position. The movement was sluggish. 

Something had changed.

  
“I distinctly remember a promise to behave,” Sesshomaru spoke, voice low. He wasn’t growling, but Inuyasha was filled with a nervous shame. Inuyasha stared up at him, refusing to respond. Sesshomaru jerked one of his arms, jostling Inuyasha and sending small spikes of pain up his stomach.

  
“Okay, fine. I did say I would behave,” He whined. 

“Did you behave?” Sesshomaru asked.

Something about Sesshomaru's look was calculating, but Inuyasha couldn't figure out what it meant. 

“Well, obviously not, asshole. Or I wouldn’t be in this shitty situation with you.”

Sesshomaru smiled. It was menacing. Inuyasha pulled his arms from Sesshomaru’s shoulders and cradled his hands in his lap. He was half tempted to throw himself from Sesshomaru’s arms. The ground was at least consistent. He knew that would hurt. He wasn’t so sure what was going on with Sesshomaru.

“A punishment is in order.”

“A pun… a punishment?” Inuyasha struggled around the words. He was human, weak, and injured. What would Sesshomaru do to him? Would he chop off his fingers? Would he hit him with his poison whip? Would he claw him to-

  
  
“I can smell your fear, Inuyasha.” Sesshomaru’s voice broke through Inuyasha’s panicked monologue. Inuyasha began to squirm anew in Sesshomaru’s grasp. The demon merely tightened his hold in response. “I will not harm you,” he said, golden eyes boring into Inuyasha’s. Inuyasha, for some reason, believed him.

  
When Inuyasha did not protest further, Sesshomaru moved quietly back to where he had been sitting. Inuyasha was overwhelmed, and began to struggle again. He reached to grab at Sesshomaru’s shoulder with the intent to dig his claws in, but he didn’t have any claws. He was still human. He tried to kick out his legs, but Sesshomaru tightened his hold around Inuyasha’s knees.

Sesshomaru waited until Inuyasha stopped squirming to threaten, “Should this physical contact fail to sufficiently convince you to behave, I will turn you over. In your current state, you would become pliant quickly.”

Sesshomaru sank down into a seated position. He did not release Inuyasha from his arms.

It took a few moments for Inuyasha to fully decipher what Sesshomaru had said.

“Like I’d let you-“ Inuyasha began, face red from a toxic mixture of embarrassment and anger. Sesshomaru leaned his head forward, invading the precious space in front of Inuyasha’s face. Inuyasha froze mid-sentence.

“There is no _letting_ me,” Sesshomaru’s voice promised death.

Inuyasha shuddered at the sound. Inuyasha knew that Sesshomaru was serious. His head hurt. He turned his head towards the fire and let it slump against his own shoulder. Unconsciously, Inuyasha had bared his throat in a sign of submission.

Pleased, Sesshomaru settled Inuyasha into his lap. Once Sesshomaru released Inuyasha’s legs, he used his free hand to roll Inuyasha’s head onto his own shoulder. Inuyasha made a noise of complaint, but he didn’t protest or attempt to move away. Sesshomaru’s body temperature was almost pleasant against Inuyasha’s chilled limbs. Inuyasha’s head was throbbing again. He was exhausted, and his mind couldn’t come up with a legitimate reason to protest his current arrangement. He was sure he would be spitting with anger whenever he felt better.

Inuyasha allowed his protesting muscles to relax.

After Inuyasha finally relaxed against him, Sesshomaru murmured, “good.”

His face burned from Sesshomaru’s approval. The fabric beneath his cheek was soft. He rubbed his face against it. A memory of the flowers entered his mind. The memory flitted away before he could think too much about it. His human body was considerably weaker than his half-demon form. Inuyasha’s injury was affecting his frail body to a greater degree. The contradictory nature of Sesshomaru's previous comments confused Inuyasha, but he couldn't figure out why. He kind of hoped the entire thing was a dream. It was embarrassing enough sitting in his brother's lap.

He was warm, though. That was nice. 

“It seems you are still feeling the aftereffects of being poisoned,” Sesshomaru murmured, and Inuyasha could feel the words vibrate through his head. Sesshomaru shifted. Inuyasha watched through half-lidded eyes as Sesshomaru wrapped the white fur around them both. Inuyasha felt even warmer than before. The pain in his stomach had dulled to a muted throb. Inuyasha pressed his free hand into the fur at his side. It was so very soft. His feet were pressed into it as well. He wriggled his toes against it. It almost tickled. He choked on a laugh.

He had heard Rin refer to it as something before. What was it? Oh. “Mokomoko-Sama,” he whispered as he rubbed his hand against it. Sesshomaru stiffened beneath him. The arm around his shoulders tightened for a moment before relaxing once more.

Sesshomaru’s left hand gently touched a piece of Inuyasha’s hair. He moved it from where it had fallen in front of Inuyasha’s eyes. He didn’t release it immediately. He rubbed a few strands between his fingertips. Inuyasha stared at the movement. 

“I am certain that you will be quite upset with me once you have healed.” Sesshomaru gently tucked the strand of hair behind Inuyasha’s very human ear.

“Mmhmm,” Inuyasha responded. He knew he was supposed to be upset in that very moment, but he couldn’t bring himself to lash out. The sluggishness of his brain prevented him from thinking too much about how he was cradled in his brother’s arms. Inuyasha looked up at Sesshomaru. The skin of his throat was so very white. His chin was sharp. The light of the fire left shadows over his eyes.

Inuyasha wanted to reach out and touch Sesshomaru’s hair like Sesshomaru had touched his. He couldn’t do it. His arms were almost leaden. One was stuck between his side and Sesshomaru’s chest. The other had a firm grip on Mokomoko-Sama. His fingers had intertwined themselves with the fur. Inuyasha settled for staring up at him, head pillowed against Sesshomaru’s shoulder. The sat in silence for some time. 

Sesshomaru did not look at Inuyasha when he spoke again. He was staring off into the distance as if looking beyond the fire and the cave. “I have done you a great disservice.”

“Mmm?” Inuyasha murmured in response. Something seemed strange about Sesshomaru. Inuyasha felt a sudden urge to comfort him. He roused his right arm. It took time to disentangle it from the fur, but he managed. Sluggishly, he thumped his right hand against Sesshomaru’s chest. He gripped onto a fold in the fabric there. He could feel Sesshomaru’s steady heartbeat through his knuckles.

Sesshomaru did look down at him then. He seemed almost amused by Inuyasha’s behavior. “If only you were always this agreeable.”

  
Inuyasha’s eyes began to close. “If only you weren’t… Such a dick…”

Sesshomaru’s chest rumbled with what seemed like laughter. He felt something brush one of his ears.

  
  
“Sleep, Inuyasha.”

And Inuyasha did.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! Sorry if the end seems a little strange. I feel like I'm definitely making this a slow burn, so I had to feed myself with physical contact or I was going to die. Besides, I thought it was kind of funny to make Sesshomaru "punish" Inuyasha by literally holding him. Inuyasha is going through it these days. He is not having a magical time. 
> 
> This should be the end of the "wake up in random places" thing going on. They'll hopefully be in a more permanent location in the next chapter. 
> 
> Please feel free to leave a review. I really really appreciate them. :)

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Feel free to leave a review if you would like. :)


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